“I suppose after that I slept again, for what’s the use of staying awake if you can’t eat? But that nap finished me. I waked up looking as I do now. It was a sad change. Maybe that is why I feel so blue and am called the indigo beetle.”
“I don’t see why you changed so many times,” said Ruth.
“Neither do I. No other insect does, but I suppose it has to be. I shall soon lay my eggs, and that no doubt will be the end of me. We seem to begin and end with eggs.”
She sighed heavily, and went on: “I have a cousin who is used to make blisters on people. Think of it! She is called Spanish fly, and she is no more a fly than you are.”
“Does she bite them to make the blister?” asked Ruth.
“Dear me, no! The poor thing is dried and made into powder and then spread with ointment on a cloth. That makes the blister. I suppose it takes ever so many of my poor cousins for just one blister. I tell you, life is sad.”
“Do stop that sort of thing, I can’t stand it!” said a plain, slender little beetle, with no pretensions to beauty of any sort. “I came here as a special favour, and then I am forced to hear such talk as that. I am never at my best in the day, and you should know it. Some of you complain of being called bug, and others object to the name fly. Now I am as much a beetle as any of you, and I’ve been called both bug and fly.”
“A lightning bug?” cried Ruth.
“Yes, and also firefly, and if it was dark I’d prove it. Of course my light can’t be seen in the day, and generally I’m not to be seen either, for we fireflies hide away on the leaves of plants until it begins to grow dark. Then we come out, and have gay times flying over the meadows. Some of our family who live in warm climates are so large and bright they are used to read by. Not only that, ladies wear them as they would jewels, and in Japan——”
But the firefly could say no more, for just at this moment some whirligig beetles came flying in and every one turned to look at them.