124 EYE SPY 



knob suddenly appears and is firmly glued to the 

 summit of the hair. Another and another are 

 added to the group, until a complete tuft or fringe 

 hangs beneath the leaf. Of course the reader 

 will have now guessed the secret of the episode — 

 that this is a mother lace-wing fly thinking only 

 of her future brood. But what a unique method 

 she employs in egg -laying! What seeming 

 reckless consideration for her offspring! Fancy 

 awakening from one's crib only to find one's self 

 on the top of a telegraph pole, or clinging for 

 dear life at the end of a dangling rope or rod ! 

 Yet such is the initial experience of the baby lace- 

 wing flies as they emerge from their filmy, iri- 

 descent cradles, whose very first experience in life 

 must needs be a daring feat of acrobatics. But, 

 hunger is a mighty incentive to work and dar- 

 ing deeds, and the lace - wing infant is born 

 hungry, grows hungrier with each moment of its 

 subsequent life, and is apparently the more fam- 

 ished in proportion to its gluttony, fully realiz- 

 ing the comment of Josh Billings upon the vora- 

 cious billy-goat, " All it eats seems tew go tew 

 apetight." 



We may be sure that this gauzy mother -fly, 

 with her appetizing reminiscences of her former 

 epicurean days, has placed her progeny in a land 

 of plenty — a land almost literally of "milk and 

 honey." For wherever we find this delicate 



