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GOOSEBERRY-FLY. 
57 
fruit thrives on smoke, but that the enemies of fruit abomi- 
nate it. In many of my neighbours' gardens, the goose- 
berry-bushes are all but dead : the old stems are naked as 
in winter, and the shoots of the year so withered, shrunk 
and lithesome, that you might tie them in knots without 
breaking them : and then the poor gooseberries are shrivel- 
led into disgusting abortions, after making a futile attempt 
to redden into ripeness. 
Now the history of the pest is on this wise. Uncon- 
nected with its object, that of giving birth to one of the 
greatest nuisances that ever afflicted a fruit-garden, the 
parent fly is a pleasing and good-looking insect, and is 
rather a favourite with gardeners, who think it the harm- 
less harbinger of the cloudless skies which accompany its 
visit. I have often watched these flies glancing in the 
sunshine, chasing each other over the leaves, spreading out 
their gauzy and glossy wings, the hind wings projecting 
from beneath the fore vdngs, like those of the lappet-moth, 
and enjoying to the top of their bent the genial influence 
of that delicious mock summer which we always have 
before the chill eastern blasts which usher in the real one, 
and which are supposed to bring the grub into existence. 
I will describe the fly : the wings are 
four, perfectly transparent, and in 
bright sunshine reflect the tints of the 
rainbow : the head and antennse are 
black : the thorax is yellow, with a 
large black spot above and below, the 
upper spot is generally divided into 
three : the body is of a clear, delicate, 
unspotted yellow : the legs are yellow and the feet black. 
I send you drawings of the fly, the leaves and the grub, 
