“Another cousin,” whispered the cicada in Ruth’s ear. “He is called the water cicada, as well as water boatman.”
“He looks more like a boat than he does like you,” said Ruth.
“My body is boat-shaped,” spoke up the boatman; “and see my hind legs; they really are like oars, aren’t they?”
“I am wondering what brought you to the surface,” said the cicada.
“Why, I let go my hold on that old water weed, and you know the air that covers my body makes it lighter than the water and unless I cling to something I naturally rise. It is inconvenient, for I do not need to come to the surface for air. I can breathe the same air over and over, because I know how to purify it.”
“How do you do it?” asked Ruth. Surely these insects were wonderfully clever.
“Oh, I simply hang to something with my front legs, while I move my back ones just as I do in swimming, and that makes a current of water pass over my coat of air and purify it. That fellow swimming on his back over there is obliged to come to the surface every little while. He carries air down in a bubble under his wings.”
“Do you mean me?” asked the backswimmer, making a sudden leap in the air, and flying away.
“Gracious!” cried Ruth in surprise. “I didn’t know he could fly.”
“There’s a good deal you don’t know,” replied the water boatman, a remark Ruth had heard before. “I can fly too,” and he also spread his wings and was off.