-scorpion, that
Master Edward Brown arrived unexpectedly, and so pressed his friend
Francis to come out and consult "just for two minutes," and so delayed
him when he got him, that the tubing melted into a shapeless lump, and
the carp died unnoticed by any one but myself.

On the fourth day the glass pond was moved into the conservatory, "to be
out of the way." The fish were excellent eating, and though the snails
were at their wits' end as the refuse rotted, and the water became more
stagnant, and the weeds grew, till all the shell-fish in the pond could
not have kept the place clean,--I did not mind it myself. As the water
got low, I found a nice bit of rockwork above water, where I could sit
by day, and at night the lights from the drawing-room gave an
indescribable stimulus to my wings, and I sailed in, and flew round and
round till I was tired, and (forgetting that no pond, not even a bed of
mud, was below me!) drew in my wings, and dropped sharply down on to the
floor. To do the family justice, they learned to know the sound of my
fall, and even the old Doctor himself would go down on hands and knees
to hunt for me under the sofa, for fear I should be trodden on.

On the fifth day I swallowed the scarlet spider. I hated myself for
doing it, when I thought of Molly; but the spider was very foolish to
meet me. He should have kept behind. And if I hadn't eaten him, the
dragon-fly larva would. What _he_ had eaten, I do not think he could
have told himself. There was very little left now for any one; even the
water-scorpion had disappeared.

On the sixth day the glass pond had only two tenants worth speaking
of--the dragon-fly larva and myself. We had both over-eaten ourselves,
and for some hours we moved slowly about through the thickening puddle,
nodding civilly when we passed each other among the feathery sprays of
the Water Crowfoot. Then I began to get hungry. I knew it by feeling an
impulse to look out for the dragon-fly larva, and I knew he knew it
because he began to avoid me.

On the seventh day Molly ran into the conservatory, followed by her
brother, and uttered a cry of dismay.

"Oh, what a state it's in! Where are the syphons?"

"Why, they melted the day Edward Brown came back. We've been having such
a lot of cricket, Molly!"

"There isn't a fish left, and it smells horribly."

"I'm very sorry, Molly. Let's throw it out. I don't want Grandfather to
see it. Let me come."

"No, no, Francis! There