"I wish I could talk to a butterfly," said Lindsay, longingly; and Grandmother laughed.
"Play that I am a butterfly," she proposed. "What color shall I be?—a great yellow butterfly, with brown spots on my wings?"
So Grandmother played that she was a great yellow butterfly with brown spots on its wings, and she said to Lindsay:—
"Never in the world can you tell, little boy, what I used to be?"
"A baby butterfly," guessed Lindsay.
"Guess again," said the butterfly.
"A flower, perhaps; for you are so lovely," declared Lindsay, gallantly.
"No, indeed!" answered the butterfly; "I was a creeping, crawling caterpillar."
"Now, Grandmother, you're joking!" cried Lindsay, forgetting that Grandmother was a butterfly.
"Not I," said the butterfly. "I was a crawling, creeping caterpillar, and I fed on leaves in your Grandmother's garden until I got ready to spin my nest; and then I wrapped myself up so well that you would never have known me for a caterpillar; and when I came out in the Spring I was a lovely butterfly."