32 BRITISH BUTTERFLIES. 



CHAPTER III. 



WltAT BUTTERFLIES NEVER DO — GROUNDLESS TERROR — A MISTAE1 

 — USES OP BUTTERFLIES — MORAL OF BUTTERFLY LIFE — PSYCHfl 

 — THE BUTTERFLY AN EMBLEM OF THE SOUL — THE ARTIST AND 

 THE BUTTERFLY. 



Amon^ the negative attributes of butterflies, I may state 

 positively, that no butterfly whatever can either sting or bite 

 in the least degree; and from their total harmlessness to- 

 wards the person of man, conjoined with their outward 

 attractiveness, they merit and enjoy an exemption from 

 those feelings of dread and disgust that attach to many, 

 or, I may say, to almost all other tribes of insects ; even to 

 their equally harmless near relatives the larger moths. 

 At least, it has never been my misfortune to meet with 

 a person weak-minded enough to be afraid of a butter- 

 fly, though I have seen some exhibit symptoms of th~ 

 greatest terror at the proximity of a large Hawk-moth, 

 and some of the thick-bodied common moths — " Match- 

 owlets," the country folk call them. 



Once, also, I listened to the grave recital — by a 

 classical scholar too — of a murderous onslaught made 

 by a Privet Hawk-moth on the neck of a lady, and how 

 it " bit a piece clean out." Of course I attempted to 

 prove, by what seemed to me very fair logic, that the 



