“‘How wise you are, Noisy! Let us sit in the dark corner and wait for the farmer’s can,’ replied Flossy, eagerly.
“So the two flies were carried from the smelly pig-sty to the nice clean, brand-new Nest built for Miss Martin and her Little Citizens. But Miss Martin didn’t know the two wicked flies had arrived to live in her Nest.
“No one knew the two flies were perched on the edges of the milk-glasses with their filthy, fuzzy legs and feet, and leaving all kinds of foreign matter on the glass rim where little babies’ lips would soon sip the milk! Neither did anyone know that one of the pesky flies had just deposited its filth on a slice of buttered bread for one of the children. But so it happened just the same!
“There had been a few other flies in the pig-sty when the two adventurers started forth, and they too decided to follow their friends. So a number of dirty insects caught hold of the horse’s legs and belly and thus were brought to camp. Here they sought out Flossy and Noisy and suggested that they all go to housekeeping together.
“‘Where shall we set up housekeeping?’ asked Noisy.
“‘Well, when we rode into camp on old Dobbin, we passed by the stables. There are a number of choice apartments about the building, and I located one in the manure heap outside. Another good flat-house is over where the dump-ground is. We can always find decaying fruit or rotting stuff there,’ returned one of the new arrivals.
“So Flossy and her husband started housekeeping in the dump-ground, while Noisy and her spouse settled in the manure heap by the barns. Noisy crawled about over the damp straws that had been swept out from the stable-stalls and soon found a fine spot to deposit her eggs.
“That evening Noisy and her husband flew back to camp to visit Little Citizens and see what they could do to interfere with the wholesome plans of Uncle Ben and Miss Martin.
“The hundreds of tiny white eggs laid in the manure heap by Mother Noisy, as her first brood of children for that summer, and the hundreds laid by Flossy in the dump-heap to found her big family, began instantly to hatch out into queer worm-like creatures. In less than twenty-four hours a swarm of these pests were stirring about as lively as could be, and in less than a day after they were hatched from the eggs, they cast off their skins. It took another day for them to shed a second coat, and then a day or two later they got rid of a third skin.
“Now they looked like little oval grubs that remained as quiet as if there was no life within them, but at the end of a week, the shells cracked open and a multitude of young flies crept out to fly away just as Noisy did from the pig-sty where she was born.