A BUTTERFLY SERENADE 33 



of the American species, at least in the twenty or more 

 specimens that I have examined ; nor can the " sweet 

 secrets" or the "trickle of a brooklet" be coaxed out 

 of any cabinet specimen of mine. 



I have several times heard of the pretty talk of this 

 butterfly. Who shall tell us more about it? Here is 

 a chance for my young entomologist to distinguish 

 himself. What is this so-called "voice" of the yellow 

 edge? Does it talk wing-fashion, after the stridulous 

 manner of the grasshopper tribe ; or with its wings and 

 legs together, as the locust-fiddlers do; or with its head, 

 like some of the beetle tribe ; or with its air-drum, like 

 the cicadas? Of course some of these methods are 

 hardly to be considered in relation to the anatomy of 

 a butterfly; but so far as an examination of our Amer- 

 ican insect would seem to show, any one of them is 

 certainly as plausible as the explanation quoted, which 

 may explain in England, but does not in America. 



The matter may be easily studied. The butterflies 

 are now frequenting the tender foliage of the willows 

 by the brook, and in a few weeks the first brood of 

 their black spiny caterpillars will literally weigh down 

 the slender branches as they strip the leaves and leave 

 their cast-off skins fringing the twigs. Hundreds of 

 the caterpillars may be gathered in a few moments, and 

 the walls of your collecting- box will soon be hung 

 closely with chrysalids, nearly all of which will have 

 been transformed into butterflies within a period of a 

 fortnight. 



There are two, or, I am led to think, even three of 

 these caterpillar broods during the year; the butterflies 

 from the last in autumn surviving the winter. 



