190 UNDER THE OPEN SKY 



Literary people call him the dragon-fly. 

 The small boy very commonly speaks of 

 him as the snake feeder or snake doctor, 

 or possibly the snake servant. His dis- 

 ciplinary parent, bent on using- the fly as a 

 bogie to ward off evil-doing, calls him the 

 devil's darning-needle, and solemnly and 

 impressively tells the refractory child that 

 the insect's chief duty is to sew up forever 

 the mouths of all those wicked little children 

 who tell lies. 



The mean side of these awful names is 

 that they are all libels. The dragon-fly is 

 as harmless an insect as haunts the river- 

 side. I have caught them by the hundred 

 and handled them freely, and there is no 

 mistake whatever about it. 



An insect's power to harm lies at one end 

 or the other. A few have a small amount 

 of venom in their bite; these are chiefly flies 

 or bugs. A few have their egg-laying tube 

 sharpened to a fine point and have con- 

 nected with it a set of poison glands; these 

 are almost confined to the bees and wasps. 

 But this fellow can neither bite nor sting. 



