NORTH AMERICA. 
81 
when they appear in the fly ftate. And if we con- 
fider the very fhort period of that ftage of exiftence, 
which we may reafonably fuppofe to be the only 
fpace of their life that admits of pleafure and enjoy- 
ment, what a leffon doth it not afford us of the vanity 
of our own purfuits ! 
Their whole exiftence in this world is but one 
complete year : and at leafi three hundred and fixty 
days of that time they are in the form of an ugly 
grub, buried in mud, eighteen inches under water, 
and in this condition fcarcely locomotive, as each 
Larva or grub has but its own narrow folitary cell, 
from which it never travels or moves, but in a per- 
pendicular progreflion of a few inches, up and down, 
from the bottom to the furface of the mud, in order 
to intercept the palling atoms for its food, and get a 
momentary refpiration of frem air ; and even here it 
mu ft be perpetually on its guard, in order to efcape 
the troops of fifh and fhrimps watching to catch it, 
and from whom it has no efcape, but by inftantly 
retreating back into its cell. One would be apt al- 
moft to imagine them created merely for the food of 
nlh and other animals. 
Having refted very well during the night, I was 
awakened in the morning early, by the cheering- 
converfe of the wild turkey-cocks (Meleagris occi- 
dentalis) fainting each other, from the fun-bright- 
ened tops of the lofty Cupreffus difticha and Mag- 
nolia grandiflora. They begin at early dawn, and 
continue till fun rife, from March to the - lafh of 
April. The high forefts ring with the noife, like 
the crowing of the domeftic cock, of thefe focial 
centinels ; the watch-word being caught and repeat- 
ed, from one to anothev-for hundreds of miles 
G around ; 
