those beautiful green caterpil- 

 lars : parsley, fennel, carrot, cel- 

 ery, poison - hemlock, cicuta, sium, dill, 

 caraway, anise, wild -carrot, sanicle, an- 

 gelica, archangelica, lovage, and water- 

 pennywort. 



This list in itself would not strike 

 the ordinary observer as especially re- 

 markable, and would seem haphazard enough to justify 

 the poet's charge of heedlessness. It is not until we 

 turn to our botany with our list that we learn its sur- 

 prising meaning. Here we find all these plants 

 grouped under the one order, Umbelliferce, or the 

 "parsley family." 



The Asterias butterfly is an expert specialist in this 

 one family of plants, and has never been known to go 

 outside of it in its selection of food plants for its young. 

 Remember, then, those caterpillars and the lesson that 

 they teach, for upon whatever plant you find them, 

 you may instantly class it as a member of the parsley 

 family. 



Then there are the Semicolon and Comma butterflies 

 that will lead you to all the plants of the " nettle " fam- 

 ily, while the little yellow butterfly picks out all the 

 Leguminosce, or bean family, and so the list continues. 

 We all know the Archippns, with her deep orange- 



