llowed him with her eyes with less surprise than
curiosity; not being able to contain herself any longer, she
determined to speak to the old fly.

"How does your companion contrive to walk with his head down in that
way?"

The old fly, satiated with sugar, turned half round to the right,
and with one spring placed himself opposite the little girl, and
stared at her with such a stupefied look, that Piccolissima,
although her good sense refused to believe it, thought for a moment
that the ten or twelve thousand eyes were all fixed on her,
forgetting, in her confusion at being thus stared at, that though
each eye had thousands of faces to mirror all surrounding objects,
still there was behind them all only one power of seeing, only one
fly.

"What matters it, in the name of all that is sweet in the world? Of
what consequence is it, when one walks, whether the head is on one
side or the other, up or down? Poor infirm creature that thou art,"
said the fly; "dost thou see any difference?"

Piccolissima, somewhat mortified at having always walked with her
head upward, remained stupefied and silent. It seems necessary,
thought she, that every surface, in whatever direction it is placed,
should have the same power to attract and support the feet of the
flies as the ground and the floor to retain mine.

Ignorant as she was, the little girl had not yet heard of the gummy
liquid which the wise ones had at one time supposed to be placed in
the sponges of the flies, nor of the vacuum, by means of which the
learned of the present day suppose these little cushions can adhere
to the most polished surfaces; and she had not yet seen flies enough
to form any opinion for herself.

"I see," said the little girl, in a small flute voice, "that you
know much more than I; do not refuse, then, to instruct me. I cannot
explain how it is you speak and breathe. Since you have kept your
trunk in its case, I perceive above it your lips closed, and I do
not see them move." Piccolissima, fearing she might be laughed at,
did not dare to add, that she had supposed that the voice of the fly
came from under his wings.

"I speak as all well-formed people speak," answered the haughty
insect, "with four voices;" and four puffs of air issued from the
oval breathing holes on both sides of his breast, giving a tremulous
motion to his two little egg-shell wings, his two balance wings, and
the roots of his two other wings. "I breathe through these opening