THE MENTOR 1915.08.02, No. 88,
Butterflies

LEARN ONE THING
AT A TIME

AUGUST 2, 1915

SERIAL NO. 88

THE
MENTOR

BUTTERFLIES

By Dr. W. J. HOLLAND
Director, Carnegie Institute

DEPARTMENT OF
NATURAL HISTORY

VOLUME 3
NUMBER 12

FIFTEEN CENTS A COPY

The Butterfly of Dreams

“You must not look upon butterflies as trivial,” saidLaleham. “The study of much smaller things hasmade modern science; and a butterfly may well lead youto the ends of the earth—and even lose you among thestars. You never know where it may take you. Thereis no hunting more full of exciting possibilities. If youdare follow a butterfly, you dare go anywhere; and noquarry will lead you into stranger places, or into suchunexpected adventures.”

He had never forgotten the day when that spell ofexquisite silence and dappled sunshine—the wholewoodland with its finger on its lip—had suddenly becomeembodied in a tiny shape of colored velvet wings that camefloating zig-zag up the dingle, swift as light, aery as a perfume,soft and silent as the figured carpet in some Easternpalace. With what awe he watched it, as at length itsettled near him on a sunlit weed; with what a luxury ofobservation his eyes noted its sumptuous, unearthly markings,and what an image of wonder and exquisite mysteryit there and forever left on his mind. In a moment it wasup and away upon its uncharted travel through the wood.Instinctively he ran in pursuit. But it was too late. Hehad lost his first butterfly.

For him, from that moment, all the beauty of theworld, and the mystery and the elusiveness of it,were symbolized in a butterfly. From that moment itseemed to him that the success of life was—the catching ofa certain butterfly.

RICHARD LE GALLIENNE.