beautiful place, whatever it is," she said, "and I'm sure,
cuckoo, I'm _very_ much obliged to you for bringing me here. Now may I
run about and look at everything? How delicious it is to feel the warm
sunshine again! I didn't know how cold I was. Look, cuckoo, my toes and
fingers are quite blue; they're only just beginning to come right again.
I suppose the sun always shines here. How nice it must be to be a
butterfly; don't you think so, cuckoo? Nothing to do but fly about."

She stopped at last, quite out of breath.

"Griselda," said the cuckoo, "if you want me to answer your questions,
you must ask them one at a time. You may run about and look at
everything if you like, but you had better not be in such a hurry. You
will make a great many mistakes if you are--you have made some already."

"How?" said Griselda.

"_Have_ the butterflies nothing to do but fly about? Watch them."

Griselda watched.

"They do seem to be doing something," she said, at last, "but I can't
think what. They seem to be nibbling at the flowers, and then flying
away something like bees gathering honey. _Butterflies_ don't gather
honey, cuckoo?"

"No," said the cuckoo. "They are filling their paint-boxes."

"What _do_ you mean?" said Griselda.

"Come and see," said the cuckoo.

He flew quietly along in front of her, leading the way through the
prettiest paths in all the pretty garden. The paths were arranged in
different colours, as it were; that is to say, the flowers growing along
their sides were not all "mixty-maxty," but one shade after another in
regular order--from the palest blush pink to the very deepest damask
crimson; then, again, from the soft greenish blue of the small grass
forget-me-not to the rich warm tinge of the brilliant cornflower.
_Every_ tint was there; shades, to which, though not exactly strange to
her, Griselda could yet have given no name, for the daisy dew, you see,
had sharpened her eyes to observe delicate variations of colour, as she
had never done before.

"How beautifully the flowers are planned," she said to the cuckoo. "Is
it just to look pretty, or why?"

"It saves time," replied the cuckoo. "The fetch-and-carry butterflies
know exactly where to go to for the tint the world-flower-painters
want."

"Who are the fetch-and-carry butterflies, and who are the
world-flower-painters?" asked Griselda.

"Wait a bit and you'll see, and use your eyes," answered the cuckoo.
"It'll do your tongue no harm t