convulsions of expiring agony, while the hideous head, with jaws gnashing and eyes turning from vivid green and red to feuille morte brown, and black-seemed to watch, in impotent fury, the hopeless efforts of its detached body. At the commencement of this hideous combat we attempted to escape by creeping gently towards the confines of that sphere of light proceeding from the lamp of the glow-worm; but when we reached its verge, we feared to plunge into the thick darkness beyond, lest other monstrous creatures, horrible as those left behind, should be lurking in its cover. Rather than encounter we knew not what, we climbed, during the sanguinary contest, to the top of a lofty tree, whose matted branches, leafless as they were, might serve, as we hoped, for concealment and protection.

The struggle between the headed and headless monsters was soon ended, and the victor, while the limbs of his late antagonist yet quivered, began to glut his cannibal appetite on the body. How can we describe the horror and disgust with which we watched, from our lofty station, the progress of this demoniac repast? and yet we awaited its conclusion with something like a feeling of hope. "The creature," thought we, “will completely gorge himself, and when, like a boa constrictor, he has become torpid and helpless through repletion, we may be able to destroy him, or at least, when morning comes, effect our escape; though, alas! we scarce know whither." Too soon, however, we found ourselves deceived; for deserting, when about half devoured, the body of it's late comrade, the monster

FEARFUL ANTICIPATION.

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again erected itself into that appalling attitude of prayer-thus watched for a few moments the slow unconscious movements of the glow-worm on the bank; then sprang upwards and seized in its terrible saw-like arms the yielding body of the luminous beetle. Its phosphorescent light flickered-disappeared -again shone with dimmed and scattered radiance, then was utterly extinguished, as the enormous living lamp was tossed and turned, and finally crushed in the grasp of its destroyer.

Then it seemed to us as if the last light of the devastated earth had expired with the life of its harmless bearer, and that we, in a world of darkness and destruction, were left alone with one devouring hideous monster. We could hear nothing but the "champ,-champ" of its ravening jaws, and the clashing movements of its rigid limbs, as it now and then turned its prey for the more convenient discussion of its loathsome meal.

The dews of that summer night were lighter than the drops which fell from our reeking forehead, and our trembling arms could scarcely retain their grasp of the leafless branches which secured our seat upon the elm.

The monster's meal was followed by a dead silence—but it was not of long duration; and then we found him to be again in motion by the renewed sound of his long horny limbs which approached nearer and nearer, as he seemed to draw them after him, in cat-like crawling progress, towards the bottom of our tree. The darkness still hid him from our view; but to him

what had happened-much less how the catastrophe had been brought about; and our first feeling of consciousness did not partake so much of terror as of a sort of satisfaction at the idea of our miserable existence having been by some means or other brought nearer to its close. We soon became aware that we had fallen from the kitchen to the cellar beneath, which Martha (poor careful soul!) had not failed to lock on the outside. A partial light was admitted through apertures in the broken floor above, and to reach one of these openings, for the purpose of effecting our escape, was an attempt which, under other circumstances, would have been immediately essayed; but whither could we go to escape from the hideous creatures which had taken possession of the earth? and, as smarting with the wounds they had inflicted, and aching with bruises, we lay crouched upon the cellar floor, which we verily believed would be our last bed, we felt a ray of comfort in the thought that here at least we were secure from their attacks. While indulging in this imagined safety, we were startled by the sound of something astir amongst the surrounding rubbish, and presently from a large mass of it, in heaving motion, there protruded the enormous head and prodigious jaws (black and shining as polished jet) of a mining ant of Brobdignagian proportions. It and its fellows had evidently been the cause of the late catastrophe; their subterranean operations having undermined the walls of our residence, and thus reduced it to its present state of ruin. Though the moment before indif

ferent to life, we now felt an involuntary desire to escape from this dark agent of destruction and its unseen comrades, whose labours might in another instant crush us to atoms. The spade we had purposed using for poor Martha's interment had accompanied our fall, and assisted by this implement we amassed a heap of rubbish whereon we climbed to the opening above. We thus regained a footing on the broken floor of what had been but three days previous our well-ordered, wellswept domicile. Oh! that giant spider! she had well avenged her pigmy sisterhood,-victims of the broom! Her victim was buried in the ruins, where, with a sigh, we were compelled to leave her, making our way in fear and sadness across our so lately trim little garden, now a spot of barrenness, not to be distinguished from the wider wilderness around. It was a summer's evening; but the glowing west, against which the defoliated trees were exhibited in all their bareness, wore much more the appearance of a frosty winter sunset. In the midst of these skeleton trees we could discern the outline of a cottage-the habitation of a neighbour some halfmile distant from what had been our own abode; and though it seemed but too probable that its occupiers might have perished, or be now perishing under the monstrous visitation which had befallen, we felt impelled towards it, in hopes, at least, of the brief companionship of some survivor like ourself. Looking fearfully around, and perceiving no living thing, we crawled onwards as well as our failing strength per

THERE are now to be seen almost everywhere, hawking about lanes and hedges in search of prey-fair as the sunshine, and fierce as its meridian rays-three insect families of the Linnæan order Neuroptera, which are well worth observing for their beauty, and studying for the peculiarities of their economy. These comprise dragon-flies, scorpion-flies, and lace-wing flies; the former, from their imposing size, well known by sight to everybody; while the two latter, though both, especially the