STATK POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 97 



to call his attention to laws governing these things, and if he has 

 books for reference. 



\\'hen you were boys, yon found in the bed of the brook, a 

 peculiar little worm encased in a roll of bits of bark, sticks and 

 sand stuck together. It made fairly good tish bait, if you had 

 no angleworms, but did you know what it was ; or how it came 

 there ; or that it would soon change into a dainty Caddice fly ? 

 Did any one ever call your attention to some ugly looking black 

 bug crawling about among the rushes of sluggish water ? And 

 would you ever have thought of watching on till he crawled up 

 some stem into the sunshine, where his skin split open and out 

 came a brilliant dragon fly, with great gauzy wings ; or did you 

 simply call it a ''devil's darning-needle" and run away for fear 

 it would sew up your mouth ? You probably found the wonder- 

 ful leaves of the pitcher plant in the meadows ; but did you study 

 it closely enough to learn that what appeared to be a generous 

 offer of drink to thirsty insects, was in reality a most wonder- 

 fully contrived deadly trap, for a carniverous plant ; and that the 

 beautiful leaf of the sundew was a similar trap for the insects? 



When you played on the ledge in the pasture, if you noticed 

 the scratches and grooves on its surface, did any one tell you of 

 the great ice mountains that swept over this country ages ago, 

 and left those scratches ? And when your father scolded about 

 the rocks on his farm, did he lay it to those same glaciers leaving 

 the boulders there ; and making the soil what it is ? And when 

 you lifted your heel to crush many an ugly worm, did you know 

 yovi were killing beautiful butterflies as well as injurious moths? 



The other day I called upon a friend on the top of Goff's hill 

 in Auburn. As I was coming away, I noticed upon a branch of 

 a cherry tree close by the piazza a brown bunch about three 

 inches long and perhaps an inch and a quarter in diameter. 

 "Oh !" I cried, "Here is a Cecropia chrysalis, do you care for it? 

 May I have it?" "Certainly you may have it," my friend replied, 

 "I noticed that there the other day, and said that there was some- 

 thing growing on that tree, and I must burn it up. I don't 

 know what it is." And so she broke off the small branch and I 

 carried it in my hand all the way home, so delighted with my 

 treasure, that I had nearly reached Buckfield before I remem- 

 bered that I had left my purse at her house. Now she had a 



