THE BUTTERFLY HUNTERS. 



CHAPTER II. 



THE FIRST BUTTERFLY. 



|N early Spring morning in New England 

 possesses a sweet charm of its own, un- 

 equalled in any other part of the world. 

 The warm rays of the sun melt the deep 

 Winter snows and send merry rivulets 

 dancing and sparkling down every hill- 

 side. The meadows are wet and soft, 

 and all the hollows are miniature lakes, 

 by which the green grass already shoots up in tall, slender 

 spires. Along the roadside, and under the old stone walls, 

 the dingy snow-banks waste rapidly away, giving place to 

 banks of emerald turf and delicate wayside flowers. 



It was on one of these sweet mornings that Hal, with 

 his net and box and bottle of ether, started out with Tom 

 to hunt for the first Spring butterfly, the Antiopa, which, 

 after living all Winter in old buildings or wood-piles, creeps 

 out to die in the warm April sunshine. 



"Are we going to tramp all over the wet, splashy 

 meadows .-* " asked Tom. 



"O no," answered Hal, "not to-day. But you need n't 

 look so fearfully at the wet fields, for long before Summer 



