OCTOBER 51 



remember a boy who was fond on wet summer days of 

 killing flies on his nursery window. I remonstrated and 

 said it was cruel, upon which he answered : ' Why ? 

 Father goes out fishing, and brothers go out shooting ; why 

 may I not kill flies ? ' The only answer that came to my 

 mind was that I could stop the one and I could not the other ; 

 this remained for ever with him as an injustice. But I 

 do think that probably the more children understand and 

 admire, the less they would wish wantonly to kill, and at 

 any rate it might do away with so much of that groundless 

 dread and uncontrollable nervous fear of insects which 

 stick to some people through life. I know some girls 

 who have to leave the room if moths innocent, soft, 

 downy moths ! come in, attracted to their doom by the 

 cruel lamp. I know others who dare not pick certain 

 flowers for fear of an earwig, which from its silly name they 

 believe to be really a dangerous enemy. Others, again, will 

 injure their health and remain all through the hot summer 

 nights, perhaps in quite a small room, with window and 

 door closed, for fear of the inroad of some winged wanderer 

 of the darkness. All this seems to me so silly, so ignorant, 

 so unnecessary ! And if children were early introduced to 

 the wonders of insect life ants, bees, butterflies, moths, 

 etc. I think they would fear them as little as the ordinary 

 house-fly, which is really more objectionable than many 

 of them. I never cared much for spiders till I heard a most 

 interesting lecture about them, when I longed to know 

 more. The process by which they weave their beautiful 

 webs has only been understood in comparatively recent 

 years. Everyone knows now that the gossamer which 

 covers our commons is spun by spiders. In old days all 

 sorts of fairy traditions hung about it, as it was quite 

 unlike the web of other spiders. The lecturer said that 

 spiders place themselves with their face to the gentle 

 breeze. This carries the thin thread they have power to 



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