THE LACE-WINGED FLY. 249 



not, we confess it, into our provided volume, but into a reverie 

 about as drowsy and dreamy as the heated face of Dame 

 Nature. And here we must notice, that, while all the other 

 children, animal and vegetable, of our nursing-mother Earth, 

 were taking their noontide slumber on her lap, one portion 

 of her family, that, namely, composed of the insect crew, 

 seemed resolved to keep the world stirring, or at least to make 

 a stir in the world, whose sunny places seemed to be entirely 

 abandoned to their use. These little impertinents, the pipers, 

 and eke the dancers of the hour, seemed, in truth, to have 

 taken complete possession of three elements air, earth, and 

 water together with a large portion of the fourth, diffused 

 through all by the fiery sun ; and, in thus possessing, gave 

 apparent life to the elements themselves, making them reel 

 again with insect 



" Mirth and revelry, 

 Tipsy dance, and jollity." 



We might have repeated appropriately, from the volume in 

 our hand, 



" Oh ! qui n'eut partage' 1'ivresse universelle, 

 Que Pair, le jour, 1'insecte apportaient sur leur aille ? " 



" This glad ebriety who could but share 

 The winged mirth of insect-season air ? " 



The intoxication of the day was with us, however, entirely 

 of the somnolent character, and we had already closed our 

 eyes on the bulkiest moving object within our range of sight 

 namely, the lashing tail of a solitary cow, ruminant in an 

 adjacent pond when we were startled by a light footstep on 

 the back of our hand. It was not exactly a fairy who had 

 come to visit us; but it was a little creature, both in form 

 and attire, of most fairy-like seeming. It was none other, in 

 short, than a lace-winged fly, 1 the most graceful insect of its 



1 Vignette to " Fair and Fierce." 



B B 



