At this moment, the conversation was interrupted, for they saw the doctor in the garden, and aunty hastened to join him, as she had promised to visit his cauliflowers with him this evening. Fred sat still lost in thought; he did not care for cauliflowers. CHAPTER IX. A LAST JOURNEY AND A FIRST. A large travelling-carriage passed by the door of the doctor’s house, in which sat alone, a lady clothed in black. It was Clarissa, who had come to carry little Nora to her home by the Rhine. The doctor’s four children were standing in the garden, and they watched it as it passed, thinking what a sad journey its occupant must have had. Their aunt stood at an upper window watching it also, and as it disappeared round the corner she beckoned Fred to come up to her in his room. He came running up the stairs. “See, Fred! I am clearing your room up a little. There are a great many useless things here; why should you keep them? See; in this box is a dead creature; let’s begin with this, and throw it away”; and as she spoke she carried the box towards a window. “What are you doing, aunty?” cried the boy. “That is my very best chrysalis; it will turn into a beautiful moth by and by; one of the finest of our butterflies, with wonderful marks on its wings.” “What nonsense!” said his aunt. “This little creature is utterly dead; don’t you see it is stiff and motionless.” “Don’t you know about caterpillars, aunty dear?” exclaimed the boy, holding fast to his box. “I’ll tell you about it. This is a chrysalis; and it seems entirely dead, but it’s only the outside that is dead. Inside, where we cannot see it, lies something that is alive; and by and by, when the time comes, this shell will be cast off, for there will be no farther use for it, and out will fly a new lovely creature with exquisite wings.” “But, Fred, I don’t understand how that can be possible! How can a poor worm, that only crawls about all its life, die, and then suddenly turn into a beautiful new creature with wings, and fly away leaving its old body behind? Do you understand it, Fred?” “No, I don’t understand it, but I know it’s so.” “Well, my dear boy,” said his aunt, seriously, “what if there was something hidden within little Nora, which was alive too, and which, leaving the poor dead shell behind, has flown on shining wings away to distant heights, where it is entering on a new and happy life!” Fred stood thoughtful a few moments, and then said, “I never thought of it in that way, aunty. Now I shall have a very different idea about Nora. How glad she must be to fly away on her new wings from the sick body in which she was imprisoned! Are not you glad, aunty, that you know about the chrysalis, and isn’t it wonderful?”