16 THE TRAVELS OF A BUTTERFLY.

‘“So far, so good,” said the caterpillar. ‘‘ But how about
the wind ?>—if it blows it will perhaps set me swinging to and
fro so that I shall dash against the cabbage-stalk, which won't
be at all nice.”

So the shrewd caterpillar tied himself up with a silken
girdle or sash from one side to the other, close to the cabbage-
stalk, moving his head across and fastening the threads now on
the right hand, now on the left, while he hung upside down all
the while. Oh, what a clever plan!

After all this work the caterpillar rested itself. Something
was going to happen inside him—he could feel that. His body
was growing shorter and thicker, his legs were shrinking into
himself; they were going—going—gone!!!

After a day or two he had shrivelled up into a short green
thing, all over black speckles, which was hanging with the
upper end in, and the lower end out of a loose empty skin.

The task of the caterpillar was almost done—it had
changed into a chrysalis, and had only now to hang itself up
again to the silk cushion above, which it managed to do by
somehow dragging itself up inside the empty skin, which still
hung there. The old skin was rolled up something like a
stocking when it is being taken off as the chrysalis inside it
climbed upward and fastened itself by some small hooks which
grew at its tip to the firm silk pad.

When this was done the chrysalis stayed perfectly still to
~wait for what would come next.

Patiently, quietly, it hung there day after day like a dead
thing. The beetles and snails which fed in the garden took no
notice of it, for they thought it was nothing but a bit of
withered stem or dried leaf. The birds thought the same.

The rain pattered and drummed on the cabbage tent above,
but it never moved, tied fast by its silken ropes. The sun