or sucking.

Now, Mr. Water Boatman, we are going to have a good look at you.

Nell says it is not like silver any more, but just a little black and
gray speckled bug.

That is because it is now on top of the water. When it goes under it is
surrounded with a layer of air, and that is what makes it look as though
it had on a silver dress.

May wants to know how it manages to take a layer of air down under the
water. If you were to look at it with a magnifying glass, May, you would
see it is covered with fine hairs; the air becomes entangled in these
hairs. Do you not remember how the leaf of the jewel weed, or
touch-me-not, as it is also called, shines when you plunge it in water?
It, too, is covered with fine hairs that hold air. Many leaves shine in
this way when put under water, and always because of the fine hairs
that prevent the air from being pushed out by the water. You see the
hairs on the bugs serve the same purpose as those on the leaves; they
hold fast the air.

Our water boatman breathes this air that surrounds him.

You know how insects breathe do you not?

Dear me, then I shall have to tell you.

They have no lungs; of course, so they cannot breathe with lungs as we
do.

Take a long breath--see how your chest rises--that is because you filled
your lungs full of air.

Well, the insects have to breathe air.

Every living thing has to breathe air. Nothing in the world could live
without air.

Even plants breathe the air, you know.

Now, there is a little row of holes or pores along each side of the
abdomen of the insect.

These are the breathing pores. No, May, the insects do not breathe
through their mouths, they breathe through their sides.

[Illustration]

You can see the breathing pores, or spiracles, as they are called, very
plainly in many insects.

You can see them on the abdomen of the locust, and in some caterpillars
they are bright-colored spots.

There are spiracles on the sides of the thorax, too, but they do not
show so plainly as those on the abdomen.

The spiracles open into air tubes that carry air to the blood of the
insect.

[Illustration: _Spiracles_]

If you watch a grasshopper or a bee, you can plainly see it breathe. The
abdomen moves in the bee as though it were panting. These movements of
the abdomen cause the air to go in and out. All insects move their
abdomens to send the air in and out, but it does not show plainly in all
of them, for, though insects