PSYCHOLOGICAL PKCULIAKITIES. 995 



EXCURSUS XXXVIII.— PSYCHOLOGIC jiL PECULIARITIES IN 



OUR BUTTERFLIES. 



One summer night, which I never can rue, 

 I dream'd a dream that turn'il out true : 

 I thought I stray'd on enclianted ground, 

 Where all was beauty round and round; 

 The copse and the flowers were full in bloom, 

 And the breeze was loadeu with rich perfume. 

 There I saw two golden butterflies. 

 That shone like the sun in a thousand dyes; 

 And the eyes on their wings that glow'd amain, 

 Were like the eyes on the peacock's train. 

 I didmv best 

 To steal on their rest. 

 As they hung on the cowslip's damask breast; 

 But my aim they knew, 

 And shier theygrew. 

 And away from flower to flower they flew. 

 I ran — I bounded as on wings. 

 For my heart was set on the lovely things, 

 And I call'd, and conjured them to stay, 

 But they led me on, away, away I 

 Til! they brought me to enchanted ground. 

 When a' drowsiness my senses bound ; 

 And when I sat me down to rest. 

 They came and they flutter'd round my breast; 

 And when I laid me down to sleep. 

 They lull'd me into a slumber deep. 

 And' I heard them singing, my breast above, 

 A strain that seem'd a strain of love: — 

 It was sung in a shrill and soothing tone. 

 By many voices join'd in one. 



Hogg.— ^ Greek Pastoral. 



When I first mentioned to a club of friends my intention to write an 

 essay on this subject, a scornful laugh greeted me, as if I were testing 

 their credulity. Yet no one, I fancy, could be a close observer of but 

 terflies without noticing that, while there is no great difference between 

 healthy individuals of the same species, there is as great a variety of tem- 

 perament between different kinds as there is between different sorts of 

 quadrupeds, to write an essay on whose psychological characters would 

 excite no special comment ; for the timidity of the hare, the cunning of 

 the fox, the ferocity of the wolf and other psychical characteristics of 

 various beasts have become proverbial. 



In their relation to man one recognizes a great difference between 

 butterflies as to how companionable they may be. According to some 

 writers, there would seem to be a certain variation among the same 

 kinds in different places, just as with other animals, according to the 

 frequency with which they come in contact with man. Thus DeCandolle 

 remarks that in the Swiss Alps the butterflies have no fear of man and 

 readily settle on the colored dresses worn by the women, while on the 

 better inhabited plains they are not known to do any thing of the kind. 

 Their fear of man or their boldness is to a certain degree dependent upon 

 their power of flight, as Belt has remarked in his "Naturalist in Nica- 

 ragua," the swiftest and strongest flyers allowing one to approach much 

 nearer than those with weaker wings, feeling confident that they can dart 



