A SHOET ESSAY ON LEGS. 89 



CHAPTEE V. 



A SHORT ESSAY ON LEGS — TAKING A WALK — BRITISH FAKIRS- 

 INSECT LIFE — DEVELOPMENT — THE TIGER MOTH — GROWTH OF 

 THE CATERPILLAR — HOW TO DISSECT INSECTS — PLAN OF CATER- 

 PILLAR ANATOMY — SILK ORGANS — ORGANS OF RESPIRATION- 

 SPIRACLES AND THEIR USE — WONDERS OF NATURE — THE 

 CHRYSALIS — SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE. 



As, in common with many other animals, mankind 

 are furnished with legs, and the power to move them, 

 it is universally acknowledged that those limbs ought 

 to be put to their proper use. But while men agree 

 respecting the importance of the members alluded to, 

 they differ greatly in tbe mode of employing them. 



To the tailor, for example, legs are chiefly valu- 

 able as cushions, whereon to lay his cloth. For the 

 jockey, the same members form a bifurcated or 

 pronged apparatus, by the help of which he sticks 

 on a horse. The legs of the acrobat are mostly em- 

 ployed to show the extent of ill-treatment to which 

 the hip-joint can be subjected without suffering per- 

 manent dislocation. The dancer values his leg solely 

 on account of the "light fantastic toe" which it 

 carries at its extremity. The turner sees that two 

 legs are absolutely necessary to mankind — i.e., one 



