"The worst of it all is," said Bess ruefully, when her mother brought up the subject, "people seem to think that I am having this done for my own especial pleasure and profit. I don't see what they think I want of them, unless I collect them, as the Chinese do the bones of their ancestors and friends, to bury them in some particular, consecrated spot. I was writing the other day, in a great hurry to finish my letter to Mr. Allen in time for the steamer, when Bridget came up to my room, and said some little girls wanted to see me. I went down to the back door, and there stood the five Tracy children, in a row. As soon as I appeared, the oldest, who acted as spokeswoman, came forward and solemnly presented me with three tattered butterflies. I had such hard work to be just grateful enough to satisfy them, and yet not encourage them to bring me any more. And the last time Mrs. Walsh called, that day you were out, she produced a small box that held a common little white moth, and told me Bert said that I wanted all those I could get, so she had brought me that one. Well, laddie, what now?" she added, as Fred came into Mrs. Carter's room, where they were sitting.
"There's a boy down-stairs," he replied, "that wants to see you. I don't know who he is. He saw me on the piazza, and went round there to me."
"I wonder who he is," said Bess, as she laid down her work and went out of the room.
She soon came up again, looking both amused and disgusted.
"Another!" she exclaimed, as she took up her sewing.
"What is it now?" asked her mother, laughing.
"It was that little red-haired Irish boy that lives in behind the church. I don't know what his name is, but alas! he knows me. He came to bring me some twigs, apple, I should think, and on each one was a horrid great worm"—and Bess shivered at the recollection—"covered with red and yellow bristles, I told him I was much obliged, but I really didn't know where I could keep them; but the poor little fellow—I shouldn't think he was more than seven or eight—looked so disappointed that I finally took them. I grieve to say that I cremated them as soon as he had gone. Fred, if you love me, do, oh, do tell the boys that we only want dead specimens. My plan was for a museum, not a menagerie; but if matters go on like this, the club will soon become my bugaboo."
CHAPTER XII.
THEIR SUMMER OUTING.
"ISLAND DEN," THOUSAND ISLANDS,
July 27, 18—.