"'Why don't you stay at home with your sober wife, instead of whisking about where I can catch you?' said the dragon-fly, shaking his pretty captive.
"Just then there approached a very singular-looking person indeed. He wore a broad hat, blue spectacles, and had a great many curious tin cases slung about his belt and over his shoulder. In his hand he carried a dip-net, which he threw cleverly over our heads, and entangled us in the bag. We could do nothing but stare helplessly at one another in dismay.
"'Oh, dear!' cried a young butterfly piteously, 'We shall now have pins driven through us, and be speared to a cardboard platter for ever. I have heard my mother say so.'
"We all shivered,—even the dragon-fly, who had been captured also. Of course the striped-faced monkeys came peeping out in the wrong time, and, after a good deal of poking into the tree, one of them was caught. Thus the naturalist gentleman returned home with his treasures, the little monkey alone of us all being destined to live.
"The first thing, upon taking us from the net, was to politely hold a bottle to our noses, which caused a few feeble kicks in the air, then a fainting fit. When I again opened my eyes, I was lying upon a board, surrounded by my companions, who were transfixed with pins upon paper, as the young butterfly had said. I certainly thought my end had come, and that hereafter my body was destined to adorn some cabinet. I pretended to be still unconscious, and so lay quite motionless under the large microscope through which the naturalist gentleman regarded me, now poking my ribs, now turning my head to one side, and all the while making remarks on my personal appearance.
"'I don't believe that you belong here at all,' he exclaimed. 'I must dissect what may prove a new species.'
"Here seemed my last chance of escape; so, watching an opportunity, when he was selecting a suitable knife to carve me up with, I drew my elf's cap from under my wing. The naturalist gentleman was too quick for me: he seized my night-cap with his tweezers, and began eagerly to examine it. I was sorry enough for the loss. Still one had better part with the fairy's gift than life itself: so I flew away. I dare say the naturalist gentleman may have carefully preserved the cobweb cap, to puzzle science with for a long time.
"Journeying on, I came to the bank of one of the largest rivers in the world. I paused to view the waves dash against the shore in foam, the vessels flit past on the strong breeze, and the distant villages on the other side. There were several low strips of sand reaching out from near where I rested, and I observed groups of natives making camp-fires, or erecting a kind of watch-tower overlooking the land. I inquired what they were doing, of a monkey who sat stroking his sandy whiskers with an indolent air.
"'Ah! don't you know?' he returned. 'They are waiting for the turtles to lay their eggs.'
"The next morning I beheld a curious sight. In the first gray dawn, myriads of turtles were creeping down the sandy slope, and flapping into the water again, their duties of depositing eggs for that season being accomplished. No sooner had they departed, than the natives gave signals, and from every direction crowded the boats to receive the eggs, which would then be prepared as turtle oil, and sold in jars.