Before continuing with a subject that fulfils these conditions, let us drop chronological order for a moment and say a few words about a late-comer who arrived after I had completed my enquiries, I mean the Lesser Peacock (Attacus pavonia minor, Lin.). Somebody brought me, I don’t know where from, a magnificent cocoon loosely wrapped in an ample white-silk envelope. Out of this covering, with its thick, irregular folds, it was easy to extract a case similar in shape to the Great Peacock’s, but a good deal smaller. The fore-end, worked into the fashion of an eel-trap by means of free and converging fibres, which prevent access to the dwelling while permitting egress without a breach of the walls, indicated a kinswoman of the big nocturnal Moth; the silk bore the spinner’s mark. And, in point of fact, towards the end of March, on the morning of Palm Sunday, the cocoon with the eel-trap formation provides me with a female of the Lesser Peacock, whom I at once seclude under a wire-gauze bell in my study. I open the window to allow the event to be made known all over the district; I want the visitors, if any come, to find free entrance. The captive grips the wires and does not move for a week. A gorgeous creature is my prisoner, in her brown velvet streaked with wavy lines. She has white fur around her neck; a speck of carmine at the tip of the upper wings; and four large, eye-shaped spots, in which black, white, red and yellow-ochre are grouped in concentric crescents. The dress is very like that of the Great Peacock, but less dark in colouring. I have seen this Moth, so remarkable for size and costume, three or four times in my life. It was only the other day that I first saw the cocoon. The male I have never seen. I only know that, according to the books, he is half the size of the female and of a brighter and more florid colour, with orange-yellow on the lower wings. Will he come, the unknown spark, the plume-wearer on whom I have never set eyes, so rare does he appear to be in my part of the country? In his distant hedges will he receive news of the bride that awaits him on my study table? I venture to feel sure of it; and I am right. Here he comes, even sooner than I expected. On the stroke of noon, as we were sitting down to table, little Paul who is late owing to his eager interest in what is likely to happen, suddenly runs up to us, his cheeks aglow. In his fingers flutters a pretty Moth, a Moth caught that moment hovering in front of my study. Paul shows me his prize; his eyes ask an unspoken question. “Hullo!” I say. “This is the very pilgrim we were expecting. Let’s fold up our napkins and go and see what’s happening. We can dine later.”