4 THE BOOK OF THE FLY 



observed maggots rolling out of the- donkey's nostril* 1 

 on to UK- ground ; lu- wondered nuicli that live animals 

 should be fly-blown. He also saw with pity some 

 iind wh"M- eyes Hies clustered. 



Pondering on these matters, one day he confided to 

 tin- Aunt his continued opinion in these words "It 

 , Aunt, to me that people who won't kill flies 

 deserve- to he fly-blown." Doubtless, it would have 

 been better it' he had expressed himself thus People 

 who will not kill fleas deserve to be flea-bitten; and 

 people who will not wage war against flies deserve to 

 be fly-tormented. However, the horrified Aunt mis- 

 took the observation for insult and impudent rebellion, 

 and what ensued need not be related as pointing no 

 useful moral. The strange child was merely a genuine 

 early nature student ahead of the times by some fifty 

 or sixty years. In due course he learnt a more ortho- 

 dox account of "Creation," and the existence of mys- 

 teries in facts physiological and spiritual, which can 

 only be imperfectly comprehended in this world. 



His craving for nature study was not satisfied with 

 the- reading of most of the cheap books then published 

 for the diffusion of knowledge. Collecting butterflies 

 and moths sufficed for some of his schoolfellows in 

 Liter years, but, not then having access to really good 

 handbooks, he became an original investigator in wide 

 fields of nature study, and thus learnt that many state- 



* Stevens' Book of the Farm and many other publications describe 



the similar affliction of sheep by (Kstrns oi-is but omit to notice the 



case of the donkey, which I have witnessed several times, but have 



u horse or pony thus afflicted. There is a fly termed 



ilis. of which the victimised host is uncertain, for Linnaeus 



was mistaken in stating that the larvae are found in the fauces of 



"horses, asses, mules, stags, and goats," entering by the nostril. 



