t.
Now, I must, with great reluctance, here set down the plain truth that
he, too, looked upon me at first with amaze not unmixed with rage and
contempt. Most caterpillars, you understand, feed upon food of their
own arbitrary choosing; and when they are in captivity one must
procure this particular aliment if one hopes to rear them.
_Slippy McGee feeding bugs!_ It was about as hideous and devil-born a
contretemps as, say, putting a belted earl to peel potatoes or asking
an archbishop to clean cuspidors. The man boiled with offended dignity
and outraged pride. One could actually see him swell. He had expected
something quite different, and this apparently offensive triviality
disgusted and shocked him. I could see myself falling forty thousand
fathoms in his esteem, and I think he would have incontinently turned
his back upon me save for his promise to Mary Virginia.
It is true that many of the caterpillars are ugly and formidable, poor
things, to the uninitiated eye, which fails to recognize under this
uncomely disguise the crowned and glorious citizens of the air. I had
just then a great Cecropia, an able-bodied green gentleman armed with
twelve thorn-like, sizable horns, and wearing, along with other
agreeable adornments, three yellow and four red arrangements like
growths of dwarf cactus plants on the segments behind his hard round
green head.
Mr. Flint, with an ejaculation of horror, backed off on one crutch and
clubbed the other.
"My God!" said he, "Kill it! Kill it!" I saved my green friend in the
nick of time. The man, with staring eyes, looked from me to the
caterpillar; then he leaned over and watched it, in grim silence.
He knotted his forehead, made slits of his eyes, gulped, screwed his
mouth into the thin red line of deadly determination, and with every
nerve braced, even as a martyr braces himself for the stake or the
sword, put out his hand, up which the formidable-looking worm walked
leisurely. Death not immediately resulting from this daring act, he
controlled his shudders and breathed easier. The worm became less and
less terrifying; no longer appearing, say, the size of the boa
constrictor. A few moments of this harmless meandering about Mr.
Flint's hand and arm, and of a sudden he wore his true colors of an
inoffensive and law-abiding larva, anxious only to attend strictly to
his own legitimate business, the Gargantuan feeding of himself into
the pupa from which he would presently emerg
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