“He uses awfully big words,” Ruth whispered to her usual confidant, Belinda. “Now to begin,” went on the sphinx, “you know, I suppose, that we belong to the order Lepidoptera, which means the scale wings, because the colour of our wings is made by scales so tiny that they are really like dust. We are divided into moths, butterflies, and skippers, and all of us are messengers for the flowers, carrying the precious pollen from blossom to blossom. Our children are generally enemies to the plants. They are called caterpillars, and seem to have a great many legs, but really only six of them are true legs and remain when the youngster is full grown. The others are prolegs. There may be two or there may be ten. They help in walking, but are shed with the last skin.” “Alas!” sighed a voice in the corner. “I haven’t any to shed—that is, in the middle of my body.” Ruth turned as Mr. Looper, otherwise known as the measuring worm, made this remark. She would have asked a question, for Mr. Looper, rearing his head after his own queer fashion, seemed quite ready to talk, but the sphinx stopped her. “This is not the time to talk about individual legs,” he said. “We are trying to get at general differences. Now there are certain ways in which all moths differ from all butterflies.” “I should say so,” said Miss Papilio, a handsome tiger swallowtail. “Moths have short, stout bodies, and ours are slender.” And Miss Papilio circled above them so that all might admire her delicate body and the beauty of her tawny yellow wings, with their gray bands and stripes, and their ends pointed in true swallowtail fashion. “And here is another difference,” she added, coming to rest with her wings folded together vertically. “We always carry our wings so when we are not flying. You moths hold yours horizontally, or sloping. Never upward.” “Well, that’s true,” said the sphinx, “and you know we generally have beautiful feathery antennæ, though I, and a few others, are an exception to that rule, but you butterflies can boast only very thread-like antennæ, with a knob at the end.” “Enough about that subject,” spoke up Miss Papilio. “What I am wondering about is why moths like to fly at night, or in the twilight. Now, butterflies must have sunshine.” “We love the cool, soft night, I can’t tell you why,” answered the sphinx, “and we sleep through the noisy day.” “But it is so dangerous to sleep as you do, when birds and other nuisances are up and doing.”