THE MENTOR 1915.08.02, No. 88,
Butterflies

The Butterfly of Dreams

“You must not look upon butterflies as trivial,” said Laleham. “The study of much smaller things has made modern science; and a butterfly may well lead you to the ends of the earth—and even lose you among the stars. You never know where it may take you. There is no hunting more full of exciting possibilities. If you dare follow a butterfly, you dare go anywhere; and no quarry will lead you into stranger places, or into such unexpected adventures.”

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

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

RICHARD LE GALLIENNE.

MENTOR GRAVURES

SPRING BUTTERFLIES

AMERICAN FRITILLARIES

ADMIRALS

A GROUP OF SWALLOWTAILS

MENTOR GRAVURES

A GROUP OF VERY COMMON BUTTERFLIES

A SWALLOWTAIL AND GROUP OF SKIPPERS

BUTTERFLIES

By DR. W. J. HOLLAND

Copyright The Century Co.

NORTH AMERICAN BUTTERFLIES

Above left—Gray Hairstreak. Above right—American Copper. Center—The Banded Purple

THE MENTOR · DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL HISTORY

AUGUST 2, 1915

The earliest memories of my childhood cluster about a little manse in the countryside. In winter, when the drifts were deep and the house was snowbound, a usual recreation was to look at the cabinets containing shells collected in Jamaica by my father during his residence as a missionary on that island. I preferred, however, to feast my eyes on the contents of certain flat boxes of Jamaica cedar, in which many of the gorgeous moths and butterflies, as well as other insects, of that sunny island were displayed.

Fig. 1

MAGNIFIED SCALES OF BUTTERFLIES

1, 2, ordinary scales. 3-5, androconia, or scales from wings of male butterflies

When spring and summer came I was very busy gathering plants, pressing them for my little herbarium, and collecting shells which I found in the woodlands and when wading the streams. Among insects the beetles and butterflies pleased me most. Later my home was in North Carolina, whither the family removed from central Ohio when I was a child of ten. Here the same process went on, with the added pleasure of being near a library, in which, among other books, was a copy of Wilson and Bonaparte’s “American Ornithology,” many of the plates in which I copied, and Say’s work on “American Entomology.” The collection of plants and insects grew apace, and I was allowed to begin to stuff and mount birds.

Fig. 2

WING SCALES

Greatly magnified scales of Cabbage butterfly

In 1863 I came north, and for ten years my life was passed in college and professional schools, where I had little time to study ornithology and entomology. But the love of living things survived, and when, at last settled in active professional life, I began to feel the need of some pursuit which would furnish a physical as well as intellectual recreation, I reverted to the study of insects. This took me into the woods and fields.

Having begun to collect insects, I made up my mind that I must learn to know all about them. I sought for books on the subject. There were none of any value in the libraries about me. I then began to buy books, and have continued, until today I possess a collection of works upon entomology which is said to be the largest in private hands in America. I began to seek information from other students of the subject. The circle of my correspondence has grown until it covers many lands. One of my correspondents, the