The Cabbage-caterpillar 



petite red cabbage and broccoli, curly greens 

 and savoy, swedes and turnip-tops, in short, 

 all that our ingenuity, lavish of time and pa- 

 tience, has been able to obtain from the ori- 

 ginal plant since the most distant ages. 



But what did the caterpillar eat before our 

 cabbages supplied him with copious pro- 

 vender? Obviously the Pieris did not wait 

 for the advent of man and his horticultural 

 works in order to take part in the joys of life. 

 She lived without us and would have con- 

 tinued to live without us. A Butterfly's exist- 

 ence is not subject to ours, but rightfully in- 

 dependent of our aid. 



Before the white-heart, the cauliflower, the 

 savoy and the others were invented, the Pieris' 

 caterpillar certainly did not lack food: he 

 browsed the wild cabbage of the cliffs, the 

 parent of all the latter-day w.ealth ; but, as this 

 plant is not widely distributed and is, in any 

 case, limited to certain maritime regions, the 

 welfare of the Butterfly, whether on plain or 

 hill, demanded a more luxuriant and more 

 common plant for pasturage. This plant was 

 apparently one of the Cruciferae, more or less 

 seasoned with sulphuretted essence, like the 

 cabbages. Let us experiment on these lines. 



335 



