sitting on the water, which instantly sink to the bottom: and most of the duns, or small slender-winged flies, do the same. The gray or glossy-winged May fly, commonly called the gray drake, performs regular motions in the air above the water, rising and falling, and sitting, as it were, for a moment on the surface, and rising again, at which time she is said to deposit her eggs. To attempt to describe all the variety of ephemeræ, that sport on the surface of the water at different times of the day, throughout the year, would be quite an endless labour. Some of them appear to live only a few hours, and none of them, I believe, have their existence protracted to more than a few days. In spring and autumn a new variety of these flies sometimes appears every day, or even in different parts of the same day. Of the beetle, or colyoptera genus, there are many varieties fed on by fishes. These insects, which are distinguished, as you know, by four wings, two husky-like shells above, and two slender and finer ones below, are bred from eggs, which they deposit in the ground, or in the excrement of animals, and which, producing larvæ in the usual way, are converted into beetles, and these larvæ themselves are good bait for fish. The brown beetle, or cockchaffer, the fern fly, and the gray beetle, which are abundant in the meadows in the summer, are often blown into the water, and are the most common insects of this kind eaten by fishes. Whether the ditisci and hydrophili, the water beetles, are ever eaten by trout, I know not, but it is most probable. These singular animals are most commonly found in stagnant waters; fitted for flying, swimming, diving, and walking, they are omnivorous, and usually fly from pool to pool in the evening. They deposit their eggs in the water, where their larvæ live, but which, to undergo transmutation into the beetle, migrate to the land. But there is hardly any insect that flies, including the wasp, the hornet, the bee, and the butterfly, that does not become at some time the prey of fishes. I have not, however, the knowledge, or if I had, have not the time, to go through the lists of these interesting little animals; but of the family of one of them I must speak—the ichneumons, that deposit their eggs in caterpillars, or the larvæ of other flies, and which feed on the unfortunate animal in which they are hatched, and come out of its interior when dead, as if it had been their parent. To enter into the philosophy of this subject, and to study the organs and faculties of these various insect tribes, in their functions of respiration, nutrition, and reproduction, would be sufficient for the labour of a life. To know what has already been done would demand the close and studious application of a comprehensive mind; and to complete this branch of science in all its parts is probably almost above human powers: but much might be done if enlightened persons would follow the