WILD NATURE. 
149 
another is the torment of those who work in the harvest fields, 
for the horrible harvest-bug is also a mite. Dried fruits, honey- 
comb and sweetmeats are all devoured by mites of different 
species, in fact it is too wide a subject to dilate upon to-night, so 
I will only describe the appearance of the cheese-mite under the 
microscope. If seen in sunlight, its transparent globular body 
shines as though it were made of crystal. The creature can 
move with some agility upon its eight brownish legs, and with 
its tapering snout-like head it browses on the minute fragments 
of cheese amongst which it lives. This mite lays eggs abun- 
dantly, and also produces young alive, which may account for 
the rapid increase of the colonies in an ancient cheese. 
The other insect which inhabits cheese is the cheese-fly ; 
this is quite a small insect, and has black markings on its clear 
wings. With its long ovipositor it will lay as many as 250 eggs 
in the crevices of a newly made cheese ; these hatch into white 
grubs without feet, but with horny mandibles with which the 
creature bores into the cheese. 
This cheese-maggot has two breathing tubes in the tail and 
two in its head, so it can breathe at either end of its body. Lest 
any particles of cheese should obstruct the front pair of tubes 
the creature has the power of drawing over them a fold of its 
skin whilst it is feeding, and it then breathes through the air 
tubes in its tail. These creatures also have the power of emit- 
ting a liquid which corrupts the cheese and renders it suitable to 
be its food. 
The leaping powers of this grub are truly wonderful. Swam- 
merdam, who seems to have carefully studied this creature, says, 
“ I have seen one whose length did not exceed a quarter of an 
inch leap out of a box six inches deep, that is, twenty-four times 
the length of its own body.” These leaps it achieves by bending 
itself into a ring and laying hold of the skin of its tail, then 
suddenly letting go, its body is jerked for a considerable distance. 
Swammerdam devoutly remarks, “ I can truly affirm that the 
parts of this maggot are contrived with so much art and design 
that one must acknowledge them to be the work of the same 
Omnipotent Hand which created the heavens and the earth.” 
Another of my house dwellers is the Lepisma, which frequents 
the kitchen hearth at night for the sake of warmth. Desiring to 
capture some of these, I stole down in the dead of night with a 
glass globe to contain my captives'. Happily we have no cock- 
roaches, else I should hardly have liked to invade the domain of 
those unattractive creatures. I saw plenty of lepismae, but how 
to catch them was the puzzle. The situation was ludicrous. 
Picture an elderly lady in spectacles gazing on her kitchen 
hearth, watching and vainly endeavouring to catch minute fish- 
shaped silvery creatures darting about like flashes of lightning ! 
At last a bright idea occurred to me. I found a soft dusting brush, 
and with it I quickly swept some of the lepismae into a plate and 
then transferred them into my globe, so that I returned in 
