A GIFT OF GOD 39 



the next he has turned his tail to me; and the 

 revolution is not always so quick but one can see 

 it effected. 



What a change from the bob of meadow-brown to 

 the skim and whir of dragon-fly ! For absence of 

 effort the flight of some dragon-flies does not compare 

 ill with that of the kestrel in still air or light breeze. 

 There is the red- bodied Sympetrum striolatum, which 

 flies in numbers by the Hampshire Loddon in Septem- 

 ber. It belongs to the whirring class of insect fliers. 

 It is carried forward, jerked at a tangent when and 

 whither it will, by a machine-like vibration. Perhaps 

 one should not use the word "stroke" of the wing 

 action of sympetruin or these other lightning fliers. 

 It seems clumsy, as if one spoke of a molecule as 

 a clod. Stroke carries with it the idea of some de- 

 liberation, of action that more or less can be followed 

 by the eye. Between two strokes, however quickly 

 delivered, there is a gap we can be conscious of. There 

 is no gap measurable by our minds between the whirs 

 that together form the flight of sympetrum. 



In some of the electric machine sheds at ironworks, 

 where water is forced up to cool the outer walls of the 

 furnaces, we may see steel rods revolving at such a 

 pace that they do not appear to be in motion until 

 we look at them rather closely. I have noticed this 

 at the great Staveley Works in Derbyshire. The 

 smoothness of the motion and its speed make the 

 revolving steel rod look as if it were not at the moment 



