Upon such slender
wings flits our New England romance!
In April the creative process described by Thales is repeated, and the
world is renewed by water. The submerged creatures first feel the touch
of spring, and many an equivocal career, beginning in the ponds and
brooks, learns later to ignore this obscure beginning, and hops or
flutters in the dusty daylight. Early in March, before the first male
canker-moth appears on the elm-tree, the whirlwig beetles have begun to
play round the broken edges of the ice, and the caddis-worms to
crawl beneath it; and soon come the water-skater _(Gerris)_ and the
water-boatman _(Notonecta)_. Turtles and newts are in busy motion when
the spring-birds are only just arriving. Those gelatinous masses in
yonder wayside-pond are the spawn of water-newts or tritons: in the
clear transparent jelly are imbedded, at regular intervals, little
blackish dots; these elongate rapidly, and show symptoms of head and
tail curled up in a spherical cell; the jelly is gradually absorbed for
their nourishment, until on some fine morning each elongated dot gives
one vigorous wriggle, and claims thenceforward all the privileges
attendant on this dissolution of the union.
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