THE FAERY YEAR 



a dropping to sleep, and then the lull of Lethe. 

 That desperate creeping away of a hard-stricken or 

 diseased creature to a dark place wears a sinister 

 look. True, there is nothing to show that any 

 living creature wild or tame except man, re- 

 cognizes such a thing as death. The theory that 

 the ox knows it on his way to the shambles is fanci- 

 ful ; could the " shepherd's chief mourner " his 

 dog really have mourned because he knew the 

 master dead ? 



But, on the other hand, there are signs in some 

 animals of an awful shrinking from this unknown, 

 unrecognized thing ; whilst, as to actual physical 

 pain, there are many signs of this, too, in the last 

 passages before unconsciousness. It is rarely that 

 one sees a butterfly just dead, or in the act of dying 

 " naturally," but I have known of two or three cases. 

 Strangely, whilst searching last August for purple 

 hairstreaks in an oak wood, I saw one of these 

 butterflies jumping about at the foot of a tree. I 

 took it in my hand. It was dying ; a few more of 

 these convulsive jumps, and it would lie still 

 enough. (A grayling butterfly was picked up near 

 the same place : it was seen to fall from a tree, and 

 was dead in a few minutes.) The movements of 

 my hairstreak may not have been those of pain, 

 but one could not feel sure they were not good 

 to see. 



