22 THROUGH THE FIELDS WITH LINNAEUS 



children do ; it was only by sad accident that they were 

 bruised and maimed. He formed a museum of live 

 insects. He scarcely knew which he loved best, the 

 caterpillar or the plant it fed upon. He loved the 

 troops of ants that crowd the dust with palpable life. 

 Some of the sorts found hereabout are large enough to 

 be visible to the most casual observer. 1 



What pleasure to a child thus to run, beloved yet 

 wild and free, beneath the trees, sheltering the cooing 

 doves, and the dryad's hair of the silver birch, his feet 

 lapped in leaves of the wild lily of the valley with minia- 

 ture racemes 2 ; the pimpernel and fern curls fringing the 

 foundations of the boulders, which served little Carl for 

 seats and tables ! Where we can generalise only a mazy 

 bewilderment of grey stems, and in the foreground a 

 crumbling grey intricacy of boulders touched with 

 orange lichen, the colours of the orange-tipped butter- 

 fly, his classifying infant eyes can spy the minute 

 green butterfly, 3 invisible to anyone else, upon the 

 whortleberries the moment it waves the brown upper 

 sides to its wings preparatory to a fresh start. It has 

 been safe, even from Carl, so long as the metallic green 

 under-sides to its closed wings hid it among the crowd 

 of leaves. Distinct to him also are a small brown-and- 

 white speckled butterfly, and an atomy dark brown 

 spotted one, 4 nearly black ; and among the commoner 



1 There are five species of Formica found in Sweden. One kind 

 is said to be eatable. 



2 Maianthemum bifolium. s Thecla Jtubi, Lin. 

 4 Ccenonympha Hero, Lin. 



