one little dragon fly head. It
_ought_ to see well.

These facets are six-sided, excepting those along the edge, which are
rounded on the outside. You cannot see their real shape without a
microscope, they are so small. But here is a picture of some facets as
they look under the microscope.

[Illustration]

Eyes like these, made up of many facets, we call compound eyes.

All grown-up insects have compound eyes, though not many have as large
ones as the dragon fly.

Only insects that chase other insects or that need to see in the dark
have very large eyes.

See what a big mouth the dragon fly has. Its jaws do not show unless it
opens its lower lip, which fits over its mouth like a mask.

I should not care to have it bite my finger.

It could not hurt very much, and its bite is not poisonous, still I
shall handle it carefully.

Some call the dragon fly a darning needle, and say it sews up people's
ears when they lie on the grass. This is not true. It does not sew up
anything. It has nothing to sew with.

[Illustration]

Why should it want to sew up people's ears, anyway?

It does nothing unpleasant but bite fingers, and it never goes out of
its way to do that.

If we let it alone, it always lets us alone.

It is our good friend because it catches mosquitoes. For this reason it
is sometimes called mosquito hawk.

We should never kill a dragon fly.

Sometimes it is called a spindle, I suppose because it is long and
slender like a spindle.

Down South the colored people believe the dragon fly brings dead snakes
to life, and they call it snake doctor.

In some places it is called snake feeder.

But it has nothing to do with snakes, dead or alive.

The French have given it a pretty name, _demoiselle_, or damsel fly, and
that is quite deserved, for the dragon fly is a graceful little
creature, as pretty as pretty can be.

[Illustration]

See, sticking out of the front of its head are two little feelers, or
antennae, as we must call them.

They are very short, but it does not need long ones.

Insects smell with their feelers, you know, but our dragon flies see so
well they do not need to smell very well, I suppose.

See how it can turn its head around. That is because it has a little
short neck between its head and its body.

Its eyes, its mouth, and its antennae belong to its head.

Of course our demoiselle can fly well; one need only look at those wings
to know that.

To fly well is quit