Part 17

The guide paused for a long time, clouds of smoke circling about his white beard and white hair. The children thought he would never go on. "I've had something on my mind for days," he said, "and I'll speak of it now. The boy or girl who learns most about the ants before September 15th shall win a prize. This prize is to be a magnifying-glass, a book of colored plates of the insects, very beautiful and very big, and a five-dollar gold piece."

"A prize, a prize!" shouted the children, jumping madly about, while Mrs. Reece and the guide smiled at each other.

"Now we've had our dinner, our rest, our pipe of peace, a plan for a prize, and we must push on for the camping-ground. Get the canoes ready."

And, with laughter and talking, the canoes were off up the river again.

A NAGGING FAMILY

"Do you know of a family around here whom no one likes?" asked Ben Gile.

The lanterns were burning brightly out on the lawn of Turtle Lodge, and Mrs. Reece had just stopped playing so that the children might rest from dancing. All the lanterns moved gently to and fro on the piazza; the children were running about, and everybody seemed to be having a beautiful and breathless time. "Do you know of a family around here," called the guide, "whom nobody likes?"

"I do," replied Mrs. Reece, laughing and slapping the side of her face. "They are just like some people, nagging, annoying, and numerous."

"Do any children here," called Ben Gile, for the third time, "know of a family nobody likes? For the child who guesses I have a pocket-knife."

"The Smiths!" shouted Peter. "My father says Mrs. Smith is always quarrelling with the choir."

"Hush!" said Mrs. Reece, seeing danger ahead. "Ben means a family right here on the piazza."

The children looked at one another, and then Jack turned shrewdly to the guide. "I guess, sir, it is mosquitoes and flies."

"Good boy, and here's the knife."

Jack thought he had never seen such a wonderful knife. It had three blades, a corkscrew, a file, and a pair of scissors, and to this day Jack has that knife.

"Come," said Mrs. Reece, "let us all sit down for a few minutes while Lizzie is getting supper ready inside."

"How many wings," asked Mrs. Reece, "has a fly?"

"Four," answered Jimmie.

"No," corrected the guide; "a real fly has only two wings. In the place of the second pair they have queer little knobbed rods which are called balancers--something like the out-riggers on your scull, Jim. These steer and steady the fly's body."

"What makes a fly bite?" asked Hope.

"They do not bite, child. A beetle or a grasshopper can really bite, because beetles and grasshoppers have heavy, horny jaws, toothed on the edge, with which to do it. But a fly has fine, sharp-pointed jaws. With these needlelike jaws they pierce a hole in the skin, then with a tiny sucking-beak, made by the rolled lower lip, they draw up the blood through this opening."

"I wonder whether any little girl here knows why flies should not be allowed in the house?" asked Mrs. Reece. No little girl did know anything except that their mothers were always driving flies out, and that these creatures buzzed and were a nuisance. "Do tell them," said Mrs. Reece.

"Well," said the guide, "the fly is such a little acrobat it can crawl up the steepest and most slippery wall and walk upside down or right side up with the greatest ease. Perhaps some day you can make a fly keep still long enough so that you can look at its foot. At the end of the foot are two little round pads thickly covered with downy hair. On each side are two sharp claws and many stiff, clinging hairs. With this flattened foot it can go wherever it wishes.

"But this same little foot is the chief reason why a fly should never be allowed in the house, for flies crawl into all sorts of dirty places, and the fine hairs catch and hold the dirt. When the fly lights on us or on the table, some of the pieces of dirt are shaken off."

"But they are so hard to catch," said Betty; "it takes Lizzie forever and forever to get them out of the dining-room in the morning."

"I know why they are hard to catch," added Jack, "for I've looked at a dead fly. They have such big eyes, like lighthouses, they can see all around."

"Yes," said Ben Gile; "there is no such thing as creeping up on a fly unawares. Flies are dirty creatures," continued the old man, "and the time is not very far distant when people will make war on them just as they do on mosquitoes. Mrs. Fly lays her eggs in unclean places, and as many as a hundred eggs at a time. These eggs hatch out quickly. It takes only twenty-one days to make a chicken out of an egg, but to make a baby fly it takes only a few hours, and ugly babies they are--little white maggots, or worms, that live and feed and grow rapidly in dirty places. Within six days the maggot becomes a tiny, dark-brown pupa, and after five days the pupa hatches out into a grown-up fly."

A dozen little girls at the party made up their minds promptly that after this evening they, at least, would make war on flies.

"And aren't flies of any use?" asked Betty.