

i$4 NATURE IN A CITY YARD 



we need from outside. Rhode Island had 

 no constitution until fifty years ago. Few 

 knew it, and nobody was the worse. Eng- 

 land cannot prove that she has one at this 

 day. A man who is sure of $1000 a year 

 is above government. He can afford to 

 watch with a careless eye the struggles of 

 Reginald's father to get city contracts. 



I turn with pleasure from the contempla- 

 tion of Reginald to the fire-flies. We en- 

 joy their mild pyrotechnics in the evening. 

 It is another rural pleasure that may pertain 

 to a city lot. One evening a visitor spryly 

 caught one in his hand a proceeding that 

 I disapprove. In a trice he had pinched 

 off the creature's abdomen and crushed the 

 rest of him. He explained : " The scien- 

 tific sharps have told us that the light dies 

 with the animal. It does n't, as you see." 

 He caught a second and served it in the 

 same way, only he slashed open the abdo- 

 men with a knife. I put both of these 

 remnants between the lenses of a double 

 magnifier for safe-keeping, and set them 

 away. At midnight, four hours later, the 

 one that had been cut open with the knife 



