6 



lars each year? Did yoii ever hear of a "cut worm?"' Go out into a 

 cornfield where they are at work. You can tell because the young 

 corn is cut off just below the ground as cleanly as if with a knife. Dig 

 up one of the cut worms. Is it a worm at all? 



But by and by, if you watch the caterpillar, it moves about less 

 and eats less, and builds over itself a strange-looking outer covering. 

 This outer covering varies in color with the material of which it is 

 made. Sometimes it is earth, sometimes leaves, sometimes silk spun 

 by the caterpillar. In this tightly fitting house the caterpillar lies, 

 perfectly quiet, sometimes for a month, sometimes for two or three 

 months and sometimes even for years. This is another stage of insect 

 life, which is called the pupa stage. 



At last movements show themselves within the case, it spKts open 

 along the side, and there comes out the butterfly. It looks nothing 

 like the caterpillar and nothing like the pupa. It does not have to 

 grow, for it is as large the moment it is born as when it dies. Did 

 you ever watch these changes from the egg, through the various 

 stages, to the perfect insect? It can be easily done. You can try it 

 with the currant caterpillar or the tomato caterpillar, and if you feed 

 them well in the caterpillar stage you will have little difficulty in the 

 work. 



But I only wanted to show you how much of interest there was in 

 bugs, and more than that, how important it was that we should 

 Ivnow more about them, and not to tell yoxi in detail how to study 

 them. 



After you have studied bugs a little while and know more about 

 their structure you will find that lobsters and crawfish and spiders be- 

 long in the same family, unlike as they seem to be to the butterflies 

 and bees and grasshoppers. You will find that there are bugs that 

 live in the water and others that live in the air; that some live under- 

 ground and some upon other animals. Indeed, you will find that 

 every possible place where animal life can exist contains members of 

 this great family, and you will no longer wonder that their number is 

 so vast. 



