72 FISHING GOSSIP. 
insects of the spring, any more than all the Ephe- 
meride are limited to the existence of a single day. 
Thehistory of the Phryganide forms one of not the least 
strange chapters among the manifold wonders of ento- 
mology. The mature female insect generally deposits 
her eggs on the leaf of a tree overhanging the water. 
Here the eggs are retained by a kind of glutinous 
substance until hatched, when the larve, strange 
little six-footed creatures, drop off into the water. In 
this new element, each larva, prompted by the un- 
erring instinct of nature, commences to collect around 
it a case composed of parts of plants, leaves, pieces 
of stick, small stones, sand, and even small fluviatile 
shells with their living inmates. These materials are 
collected and secured by loose threads of a glutinous 
kind of silk spun from the mouth, as practised by 
several caterpillars. The larva first collects a suf- 
ficiency of materials before it attempts to enclose 
itself, for it is obvious that the longer it builds, the 
less constructive action it can maintain. A remarkable 
instance of adaptation of materials is seen in those 
cases constructed of small stones, of all shapes, full. 
of angles and irregularities, out of which the larva 
forms a tube as straight, smooth, and uniform in the 
inside as a gun-barrel. Nor is this all; as the case 
is a movable house, which the insect drags about at 
will, the under surface must be as smooth and free 
from projecting inequalities as the inside. The larva, 
