he kept on steadily--puff--puff--puff, till the noise
within the tree grew fainter and fainter, and at last entirely ceased;
and then they knew that the fatal work was done then the bellows were
withdrawn, the hole carefully closed up with clay, and the tree left as
it was till the Monday morning, when Sam was to get some wedges and a
beetle and split it open, so as to obtain the nest without damage, if
possible. Harry was for having the tree split at once, but Mr Inglis
was of opinion that it had better be left as it was for the time, and
led the way towards the house.

As soon as they were all seated in the dining-room, Mr Inglis brought
out the large mahogany box containing the microscope, with the different
specimens which he had prepared for inspection, and Fred was soon
astonished with the wonder which he saw, such as flies' eyes, displaying
within themselves innumerable other tiny eyes, each evidently possessing
its own powers of vision. Then there was down off a butterfly's wing;
the wings of flies; the wing-cases of beetles, displaying colours of the
most gorgeous hues, and glittering like precious stones; tiny insects,
such as seen creeping upon the opening buds of roses: and all these,
with numberless other things, were displayed to the astonished boy's
gaze. Most of these had been seen by Harry and Philip many times
before, so that Fred had a very long inspection of the microscopical
wonders, and was greatly puzzled to understand how many hundreds of
times any little object could be magnified; and, on afterwards looking
beside the microscope at the speck upon the glass plate, which, when he
looked through the instrument, had appeared to be of the most gorgeous
tints, he could scarcely believe that both objects were the same; and he
kept taking his eye from the instrument to look down the side, and then,
with a wondering air, back again.

And so the evening quickly passed away, for Mr Inglis had a large
collection of objects for the microscope, and, what was more, a genial
way of chatting about them, imparting plenty of useful knowledge at the
same time, but in so interesting a manner that the boys were never-tired
of listening, and would hardly believe it when they heard at last it was
bed-time.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY.

The next day being Sunday, the boys walked over to church with Mr and
Mrs Inglis--to the pretty old church that looked as if it was built of
ivy, so thoroughly