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I had not gone more than a mile from Lake Point ere I found the way profusely decked with flowers, mostly compositae and purple leguminosae, a hundred corollas or more to the square yard, with a corresponding abundance of winged blossoms above them, moths and butterflies, the leguminosae of the insect kingdom.
Signs of animal life in the Karroo are few and far between. There are scarcely any flowers to attract butterflies, and I never saw more than four or five species of birds. Sometimes too, at nightfall, a large bird would fly with a strong harsh note across the stony veldt to the kopjes in the distance. Of the larger fauna I saw only the springbok.
Straight before that martial figure, on the bridle-path, a man with a dump-cart and a shaggy-footed horse was picking up leaves. He used a shovel. And each time he raised it to shoulder-height and emptied it into his cart, a few of the leaves went whirling away out of reach like frightened butterflies. But she had no time to pretend anything of the kind.
Shortly before sunset we arrived at our halting-place for the night and point of departure for the morrow a hollow in the hills, hemmed in by high rocks, almost circular in shape and about a quarter of a mile in diameter. The air was motionless and the temperature mild, the ground covered with grass and shrubs and flowers, over which hovered clouds of bright-winged butterflies.
Occasionally, without any cause which I could detect from my present position certainly in no way connected with my presence a small swarm of the butterflies would rise in a flutter above the bush, as though actuated by a common whim a brief winged tangle in which a beautiful sprite of velvety black hovering in a globular halo, shot through with two white semicircular arcs, was always a momentary feature.
I never knew Georgiana Jane, but her people must have been very fond of her, for her grave was scarlet with geraniums, and pink with roses from earliest spring until frost, and the bright colours attracted swarms of butterflies.
Fred at first only looked upon the gaily-painted butterflies, and bright rose beetles, as being beautiful, till he heard some of the explanations from Mr Inglis, when he found that in some of the smallest insects they captured there were ten times the beauties and wonders that were to be found in their larger companions.
Arachne had set up her loom in the shade of a mulberry tree, where butterflies were flitting and grasshoppers chirping all through the livelong day. But Athena had set up her loom in the sky, where the breezes were blowing and the summer sun was shining; for she was the queen of the air. Then Arachne took her skeins of finest silk and began to weave.
Desmond's dance and in a home-made dress seemed not so much a "coming out" as an "oozing out." There are degrees in butterflies, and she feared her appearance would resemble not the gorgeous "Red Admiral" or "Painted Lady," but the "Common White Cabbage."
It was now getting quite dark; for he had stayed longer than he was aware of in the little hut; the firs stood black and deep on either hand; he would have been frightened perhaps, but he was tired; he closed his eyes and played at being asleep in his little bed at home. When he opened his eyes again, he saw bright lights flitting through the gloomy fir-trees like so many luminous butterflies.
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