CHAPTER IV. 

 FLIES: "THE HOSTS OF ACHOR." 



FLIES and spiders are naturally associated. To the fly the 

 association is grim enough, and among the most appealing 

 sounds in nature is the long-drawn cry of the captive shrilling 

 its life out in the spider's web. And yet, extending a suffi- 

 cient sympathy to the victims, I am tolerably content to 

 know that the spinner's toil has not been all in vain. 

 When I see the glistening husk of an empty bluebottle 

 hanging outside a cob-webbed chink, rattling like a calabash 

 on a savage's door-post, I drop the tributary tear to departed 

 worth; but remembering, anon, the burly trespasser that 

 one slumberous afternoon in midsummer filled my room 

 for an hour together with the intermittent horror of its buzz 

 as maddening in the suddenness of its cessations as in the 

 heartiness of its recommencements, now quartering the 

 carpet, now hurtling about on the ceiling, everywhere by 

 turns and nowhere long I cannot but admire the kindliness 

 of nature in bestowing on the poor spider the gift of spinning 

 webs. 



' ' Wouldst fill the wholesome universe with flies 

 and make the air too thick for human health ? 

 Death is no evil. Cease, O foolish man 

 thy querulous moaning, and consider death 

 no longer as thy foe." 



Those who think that the foremost function of the poet 

 is the drawing of morals should be content with the treat- 

 ment which " flies " receive in verse. 



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