312 THE WHEAT-FLY. 



There is a certain little fly, with a bright orange-coloured 

 body, rounded and fringed wings, and feathered antennae, 

 belonging to the Longleg family, but compared with which 

 the " Father" of it is a perfect giant. As with his Robin 

 Hood relative, the rapacious propensities of this Little John 

 are all exercised in early life the period, namely, of his grub- 

 hood when he " sows his wild oats" by committing excesses 

 on our cultivated crops of wheat. While these are yet in 

 bloom he revels on the pollen florets, and leaves, in the deficient 

 or withered grain, serious tokens of his destructive presence. 



So extensive, in a multiplied form, are the injurious opera- 

 tions of this tiny midge, that he and his companions in mis- 

 chief have acquired generally notoriety, under the name of 

 the "Wheat-fly." 1 



Besides the above, there is a mixed multitude of small 

 Tipulce, or long-legged flies, much resembling, and often con- 

 founded with, the gnat ; though the common gnat is sufficiently 

 distinguished by the singular transformations of its aquatic 

 larva, described already in " A Life of Buoyancy." In their 

 last and perfect stage, many, however, of these Tipulidan flies 

 or gnats, are full as buoyant as those to which the latter appel- 

 lation more properly belongs : like them, they are often alert 

 and joyous, while other insects are dead or dormant; like 

 them, fly unwetted in the shower, and often, like them, dancing 

 in the winter shade, hold, in defiance of the gloomiest season, 

 their " mid-day sports and revelry." 



But it is not with such diminutives that we should conclude 

 handsomely our notice of the line of Longlegs. Let us 

 return instead to the stilted " fathers" or mothers of the 

 tribe, with a random guess at the derivation of one of their 

 incongruous appellations. Why they should be called " Tailors" 

 we cannot tell, unless, as animals made up of legs, they may 

 be considered but as fractions ninth parts, perhaps, of an 

 insect. Why creatures never known to spin a thread should 



1 Cecidomyia Tritici, Kirby. 



