Cabbage miller on red clover blossom.
Keep the cabbage worms in the jar for a few days and watch them disappear. After they have disappeared, what is left in the jar? These are the chrysalids or pupae of the insect and later from them will come the millers. Take one of the pupae in your hand and see if it can move. If it is in the summer the miller will appear in a week, but if it is in the late fall it will simply pass the winter in the pupa stage. Watch the miller escape from the pupal case and describe it. Examine the miller carefully and describe briefly the number of legs, wings, segments of body, sucking tube and color markings. Make careful drawings of the caterpillar, chrysalis and butterfly. What gives the color to the wings? Rub the wings between your fingers and see if the color comes off. The wings are covered with very small scales of different colors which combine to give the beautiful markings. The wings of all butterflies and moths are covered with scales and hairs in this way. In this insect we find both chewing and sucking mouth parts. The caterpillar chews while the parent butterfly has a long tube for sucking up nectar from flowers and water from puddles in the road.
"Far out at sea—the sun was high,
While veered the wind and flapped the sail;
We saw a snow-white butterfly
Dancing before the fitful gale
Far out at sea.
"The little wanderer, who had lost
His way, of danger nothing knew;
Settled a while upon the mast;
Then fluttered o'er the waters blue
Far out at sea.
"Above, there gleamed the boundless sky;
Beneath, the boundless ocean sheen;
Between them danced the butterfly,
The spirit-life of this vast scene,
Far out at sea.
"The tiny soul that soared away,
Seeking the clouds on fragile wings,
Lured by the brighter, purer ray
Which hope's ecstatic morning brings—
Far out at sea.
"Away he sped, with shimmering glee,
Scarce seen, now lost, yet onward borne!
Night comes with wind and rain, and he
No more will dance before the morn,
Far out at sea.