26 THE BUTTERFLY HUNTERS. 



and she keeps it on her work-table, Johnny has found 

 some for her, and I promised to carry her mine." 



" You shall carry them to her," said Rose. *' Annie has 

 to sit still all day, and it will amuse her to watch them." 



By this time the sun was shining very bright and warm, 

 and the boys started off. 



With their nets thrown over their shoulders, and each 

 one carrying his specimen-box, they walked up the little 

 narrow road that wound by the foot of the mountain. It 

 was one of those delicious little country roads, in which 

 there is a beaten track for each wheel and one in the 

 centre trodden by the horse's feet, and between the tracks 

 a little ridge of grass. A thick hedge of Birches and 

 Alders bordered each side of the road, broken only here 

 and there to give room to an old moss-grown pair of bars. 

 The boys walked along, each trying to balance himself on 

 the narrow ridges of grass. Tom slipped off several times, 

 his feet going plump into little pools of water which had 

 settled in the wheel-track after the rain. Finally they 

 stopped, and leaned on an old pair of bars. 



"Tom," said Hal, "we may as well go right off into the 

 fields. In this road the trees and bushes keep it so damp 

 that the butterflies are afraid to fly." 



So they jumped over the bars, and, after crossing a 

 broad marshy brook on some stepping-stones which Hal 

 had placed there long before, they ran up the slope of 



