Be sure and feed them enough, or else they will eat each other, and that
would be a pity; and be sure there are some water plants for them to
hide under and crawl upon.

You can give them a little fresh fish or a tiny bit of very fresh meat,
though they like best the living things they find in the bottom of the
pond.

[Illustration]

When the dragon fly larva first hatches it is very small and its legs
are rather long and spidery, but it eats and eats and eats,--my, how it
eats!

And it grows and grows, and one day it finds its skin too tight.

A tight skin must be rather uncomfortable.

But the larva does not care much for its skin.

It merely splits it open down the back and pulls itself out.

Perhaps you think it must be yet more uncomfortable to be without a
skin.

But it is not without a skin. It is covered by a new and soft one that
soon hardens, and that is larger than the old one.

It wriggles out of its old skin as though it were an old coat, and
leaves it clinging to the weeds in the pond.