aio BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



So many did I open that I at last grew tired of 

 the process, like a man to whom the post has brought 

 too many letters ; but there was one — ^the last I 

 opened — ^the living active contents of which served 

 to remind me that some insects are unable to make 

 a cylinder for themselves, having neither gum nor 

 web to fasten it with, and yet they will always find 

 one made by others to shelter themselves in. Here 

 were no fewer than six unbeautiful creatures, 

 brothers and sisters, hatched from eggs on which 

 their parent earwig sat incubating just like an eagle 

 or dove or swallow, or, better still, like a pelican ; 

 for in the end did she not give of her own life-fluid 

 to nourish her children i Unbeautiful, yet not 

 without a glory superior to that of the Purple Em- 

 peror, and the angelic blue Morpho, and the broad- 

 winged Ornithoptera, that caused an illustrious 

 traveller to swoon with joy at the sight of its supreme 

 loveliness. Du Maurier has a drawing of a little 

 girl in a garden gazing at two earwigs racing along 

 a stem. " I suppose," she remarks interrogatively 

 to her mamma, " that these are Mr. and Mrs. 

 Earwig i " and on being answered affirmatively, 

 exclaims, " What could they have seen in each 

 other i " What they saw was blue blood, or 

 something in insectology corresponding to it. The 

 earwig's lustre is that of antiquity. He existed on 

 earth before colour came in ; and colour is old. 



