Birds and Nature, Vol. 12 No. 2 [July 1902]. Various

I shall never outlive the impressions which that rare pleasure left with me. It was one of the large-winged, black-white-and-yellow fellows which every one admires so much, and which species is regarded as a treasure here in these Central States. Little by little the ugly casing opened, and when I first saw the baby butterfly he was like a tiny mass of mingled colors, with neither life nor shape to give me an idea of the sort of creature into which he would develop. Soon he began to move uneasily, like a child awaking out of a long sleep; then he stretched his wings leisurely as though proud to have found them at last. Next he drew himself up and finished bursting his paper-like shell, gained a foothold on the plank on which we had placed him and looked about with a, seemingly, very much surprised though gratified air. Meanwhile he kept working his wings and stretching them anon, very impatient because of their, to him, slow growth. At last he gained the confidence to try them, and within an hour from the time we first saw him he had arisen and flown away into the sunshine to seek his place in the world.