2 FLASHLIGHTS ON NATURE 



To the world at large, the aphides, as we call them, 

 are mere nameless nuisances pests that in- 

 cur choicest plants ; to the eye of the naturalist, 

 they are a marvellous and deeply interesting 

 group of animals, with one of the oddest pedi- 

 grees, one of the queerest biographies, known to 

 science. 



I propose, therefore, in this paper briefly to 

 recount their story from the cradle to the grave ; 

 or, rather, to be literally accurate, from the time 

 when they first emerge from the egg to the moment 

 when they are eaten alive (with some hundreds of 

 their kind) by one or other of their watchful ene- 

 mies. In this task I shall be aided not a little 

 by the clever and vivid dramatic sketches of the 

 Aphides at Home, which have been prepared for 

 me by my able and watchful collaborator, Mr. 

 Frederick Knock, an enthusiastic and observant 

 naturalist, who thinks nothing of sitting up all 

 night, if so he may catch a beetle's egg at the 

 moment of hatching ; and who will keep his eye 

 to the microscope for twelve hours at a stretch, 

 relieved only by occasional light refreshment in the 

 shape of a sandwich, if so he may intercept some 

 rare chrysalis at its moment of bursting, or behold 

 some special grub spin the silken cocoon within 

 whose case it is to develop into the perfect winged 

 insect. 



Rose-aphides, or "green-flies," as most people 

 call them, are, to the casual eye, a mere mass of 

 living " blight " a confused group of tiny trans- 



