THE ANT-LION. 351 



pearl colour, within it, which covers its whole 

 body. 



When it has lain some time in this case, it throws 

 off its outer skin, and becomes an oblong nymph or 

 chrysalis, in which a careful eye may trace the form 

 of the fly into which it is to be transformed. This 

 nymph makes its way about half out of the shell, 

 and remains in this condition, but without further 

 life or motion, till the perfect fly comes out at a slit 

 in the back. In this last state, as I have before 

 observed, it much resembles the dragon flies. 



When this insect forms its pit in a bed of pure 

 sand, it is made and repaired with great ease ; bur, 

 where it meets with other substances among the 

 sand, the labour becomes much more embarrassing. 

 If, for instance, when the creature has half formed 

 it, it comes to a stone of some moderate size, 

 it does not desert the work on this account, but 

 goes on, intending to remove that impediment the 

 last. When the pit is finished, it crawls backward 

 up the side of the place where the stone is ; and, 

 getting its tail under it, takes great pains and time 

 to get it on a true poise, and then begins to crawl 

 backward with it up the edge to the top of the pit 

 to get it out of the way. It is a very common thing 

 to see the Ant-lion labouring in this manner at a 

 stone four times as big as its own body ; and as it 

 can only move backward, and the poise is difficult 

 to keep, especially up a slope of such crumbling 

 matter as sand, which moulders away from under 

 its feet, and necessarily alters the position of its 

 body, the stone very frequently rolls down, when 



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