DKAGON-FLIES, ETC. 211 



astonish the insect in the least, and we may see them 

 gently lifted, spread, lifted again, and then partially 

 closed, with all the dexterity which nothing hut cither 

 long practice or an intuitive instinct could accom- 

 plish. When, by exposure to the air, and this gentle 

 and skilful exercise combined, they have become 

 sufficiently hardened, for they are at first quite soft, 

 the beautiful insect hesitates no longer, but at once' 

 rises into a new element — his powers of moving and 

 sustaining himself in which form a singular con- 

 trast to those by means of which his dwelling at the 

 bottom of muddy ponds was made easy and delight- 

 ful to him. We are led to a curious train of re- 

 flections when we ask ourselves by Avhat means 

 the so-lately creeping creature, newly and suddenly 

 gifted with the power of flight, knows at once the 

 purpose of the beautifully-tinted fans which have 

 issued from his shoulders, and hesitates not to use 

 them with the boldness of a creature already 

 practised in all the technicalities of the art of flying. 

 We see a young bird, even when fully fledged, 

 spread its feathered pinions in a vague, helpless 

 kind of way, till the parent bird, flitting from 

 branch to branch, tempts the pupil to follow, each 

 time selecting a rather more distant point, till the 

 use of the wing is gradually learnt, as it were, from 



