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The only Mantis that I was able to observe at the moment of laying her eggs worked upside-down, clinging to the wire near the top of the cover. My presence, my magnifying-glass, my investigations did not disturb her in the least, so absorbed was she in her labours.
Without a word Burke handed Kennedy a pocket magnifying-glass, and Kennedy carefully studied the bill. He was about to say something when Burke opened his capacious wallet again and laid down a Bank of England five-pound note which had been similarly treated.
Dad didn't say anything at the time, so I was not looking for the roast I was getting. It appeared, from his view-point, that I was about as useless, imbecile, and utterly no-account a son as a man ever had, and if there was anything good in me it was not visible except under a strong magnifying-glass.
You see my young master, or my young mistress, poring over one of their spiders' insides with a magnifying-glass; or you meet one of their frogs walking downstairs without his head and when you wonder what this cruel nastiness means, you are told that it means a taste in my young master or my young mistress for natural history.
Then he spread the leaf out flat and examined it. You can imagine our surprise when we found that the inside of the leaf was covered with signs and pictures, drawn so tiny that you almost needed a magnifying-glass to tell what they were. Some of the signs we couldn't make out at all; but nearly all of the pictures were quite plain, figures of men and mountains mostly.
The old man's nervous fingers travelled over the surfaces quickly, an expression of complete satisfaction in his face. "Have you the magnifying-glass, dear? Tell me what you make of the inscriptions," he said, at the same time carefully feeling the curious mediaeval lettering of one of the casts. At the same instant she started, rose quickly from her chair, and held her breath.
On my return, I learned that Professor Agassiz had been at the Museum, but had gone, and would not return for several hours. My fellow-students were too busy to be disturbed by continued conversation. Slowly I drew forth that hideous fish, and with a feeling of desperation again looked at it. I might not use a magnifying-glass; instruments of all kinds were interdicted.
I broke up the mould and spread it under the magnifying-glass. It was like looking for needles in a haystack; but at last I recovered my little Cigales. They were dead, perhaps of cold, in spite of the bell-glass with which I had covered the pot, or perhaps of starvation, if the thyme was not a suitable food-plant. I give up the problem as too difficult of solution.
It had all been one long-drawn physical torture; and the grey plaster smeared on his face showed it ghastly even beyond nature. "Here, sit down; strip your leg, and let me have a look at it." The examination took some fifteen minutes, perhaps; the Doctor kneeling and inspecting the growth with the aid of a pocket magnifying-glass.
"I thought I would die laughing when he took me into the coal-cellar, but I kept a straight face." "Do you think he's good-looking, Hetty?" "Who? John Flutter! good-looking? He's a perfect fright." "That's just what I think. Oh, isn't it too good to see the way he nurses that little mustache of his? I'm going to send him a magnifying-glass, so that he can count the hairs with less trouble."
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