46 UP AND DOWN THE BROOKS. 



case, one may look in and see that the egg-mass 

 lias separated into several oval eggs. 



How full the world is of insect-life. Most of 

 us have no idea of the number of our neighbors. 

 It seems sometimes to the bug-hunter as though 

 there would be but very few vacant rooms to rent 

 in Nature's house. And yet the insects keep com- 

 ing till even the flies take to the water. One can 

 see a multitude of little flies sitting upon the sur- 

 face of this pool sometimes. I do not know how 

 many insects there are on an average to each 

 plant in this country, but an English entomolo- 

 gist reckons that on an average there are six kinds 

 to a plant in his country. Harris thinks that 

 probably our average is less. Yet the hunter can 

 see that there is hardly a crack or cranny in the 

 bark of these trees but some insect has found it 

 out. 



Go by those willows in May and you will see 

 leaves curiously connected, two or three fastened 

 together near the tips. Tear such leaves apart, 

 and lo, there is within a tiny gray weevil with 

 pointed snout. Sometimes two or three of the 

 weevils are in the same connected leaves. On 

 those willows, too, in May, one may find numer- 

 ous caterpillars, and the queer larvae of what I 

 suppose to be saw-flies, since, when touched, each 

 larva has that strange habit, peculiar to saw-fly 

 infants, of assuming curious attitudes, standing 

 on the fore part of the body, the hinder part be- 



