I’d be a butterfly, living a rover,
Dying when fair things are fading away,
I’d be a butterfly, &c.
Thomas Haynes Bayly.
In 1828 a small volume was printed at Malton, entitled “Psychæ; or Songs of Butterflies. By T. H. Bayly, attempted in Latin Rhyme by the Rev. Francis Wrangham, M.A., F.R.S. (Archdeacon of the East Riding of York.”) in which occurs the following admirable Latin version of the above song:—
Ah sim Papilio, natus in flosculo,
Rosae ubi liliaque et violae patent;
Floribus advolans, avolans, osculo
Gemmulus tangens, quae suave olent!
Regna et opes ego neutiquam postulo,