Miss Elliot's Girls / Stories of Beasts, Birds, and Butterflies

Ruth called to him. She was sitting in the vine-shaded

t there a field of tobac

; two

cco plants and find me a large green w

y gr

mer," he said. "Pat Heeley hires me to smash

on the leaf where he is feeding

rning Ruth Elliot had her fi

ice on you. See that horn on his tail? When you wa

is nice little house I have got ready for him, and give him all the

ammy met Roy Tyler, and told him (as a secret) that the lame lady at the minister's house kept worms

ld tin basin, eight worms of various sizes, from a tiny baby worm just hatched, to a great, ugly creature, jet black, and spotted and

Greeny," the boy said; and by

he next morning, and watched

y make their great jaws go like

and butter 't would cost a lot to

delicate green, shaded to white, on his back, and that row of spots down his sides looking like buttons! I call him Sl

t is, that look

looked so strangely that I thought he was going to die; b

what is he goin

heir food with them, and did not mind. Then she tipped their house upside down, and brushed out every stick and

e parsonage, three flower-pots of moi

ing at them; "and it's about time for my tenants to move in. Gree

m turn

eed; look

is back had changed to gray-white

ully; is he g

his afternoon and s

. Their summer residence, empty and uncovered, stood out in

th said; "they were in such haste to

to get out. Soon he began to burrow. Straight down, head first, he went into the ground. Now he was half under, now three quarters, now

he have to st

inter,

r fe

ly to lie snug and quiet under the ground a while; then wake and come up to the sunshine s

s like-it

it like

olks, Miss Ruth?

my wings

e mor

." Then glancing at her crutch, re

the door-yard yellow, the flower-pots were removed to the warm

een worm,

by-a

all

so

the

ened, and one day Miss Ruth took from a box and laid in

little brown j

se your hand gently an

; and then: "Oh! oh! he

as climbing to the top of the box. Soon he hung by his feet to the netting, rested motionless a while, and then slowly, slowly unfolded his wings to the sun. They were brown and white and pink, beautifully shaded, and his body was covered wi

olded wings, in the open window. Up from the garden came a soft breeze sweet with the breath of t

s "took their wings and flew away