The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast, Ballantyne and Roscoe [first color ebook reader txt] 📗

It was, perhaps, the strangest dinner-party that ever was seen. There were such a multitude of odd creatures, of all shapes and sizes and colours; some of whom were by nature bitter enemies, and would have fought and killed each other had they met in the woods while taking a walk, but were quite civil and polite to one another, now that they met as guests in Mrs Butterfly’s bower. Indeed, many of them wished that they could be such good friends at all times as they were then.

All the party had now arrived, and there was a great deal of talking, and buzzing, and humming, and jesting, as they sat round the table and feasted on the good things placed before them. The table was a mushroom, covered with a table-cloth of water-dock leaf, and on it were placed all the delicious dishes of the woods. The Dormouse brought a good deal of wheat, oats, and barley. The Squirrel brought a bagful of nuts. The Humble-bee brought a quantity of fine honey in the comb, which was declared to be most excellent. In short, every one brought something or other; so that, when all was spread out beside the good things supplied by Mrs Butterfly and Mr Grasshopper, it seemed the grandest feast that ever was heard of. Such fun there was, to be sure! And such a multitude of voices talking all at once.

“My dear,” cried the Butterfly across the table to the Grasshopper, “I hope you are attending to your friends there. See that you give them enough to eat, and plenty of mountain-dew to drink.”

“Yes, yes, my love,” replied the Grasshopper as well as he could for laughing at the jokes of a bloated old Spider that sat beside him. Then the Grasshopper called to the Butterfly to send him a slice of wheat; but, as the noise prevented his being heard, he jumped over the table at one bound, helped himself, and bounded back again. Two or three young Crickets and five or six Midges sat at a little side mushroom. They made more noise than all the grownup people put together; and the lady Butterfly looked round at them with a smile once or twice, quite delighted to see them so happy, and to hear their merry voices ringing through the woods.

With steps more majestic the Snail did advance,

And he promised the gazers a minuet dance;

But they all laughed so loudly, he pulled in his head,

And went, in his own little chamber, to bed.

After dinner the ball began, and it was the strangest ball that ever was seen. The trumpeter Gadfly and a number of his relations, besides several Grasshoppers and Bees, were the chief musicians. They wanted a bass very much at first, but the Bull-frog offered his services, although he confessed that he was accustomed to sing alone. Then the gentlemen drew on their gloves, flattened their wings, pulled up their collars, and coiled away their tails; while the ladies tightened their garters, ruffled their feathers, and put out their feelers. Oh how they did dance! reels were nothing to it. The greatest difficulty was to keep the Grasshoppers in order. They became so excited that they sprang quite out of sight every moment, and so lost their partners, and ran against everybody in searching for them. Then the Bull-frog, who sang bass, got a little too much of the dew, and sang so loudly, that he quite drowned all the other players. So Mrs Butterfly put her claws in her ears, and running up to him, said, “Oh! dear Mr Bull-frog, pray do not sing quite so loudly.” The poor Bull-frog was almost weeping with joy at the merry scene before him, but he blushed very green on hearing this, and said he had forgotten what he was doing, but would try to be more careful. However, in five minutes more he was worse than ever, so they sent a few hundred bees to sing treble beside him, and try to keep him in order. In the middle of all this there was a sudden stop, and a Snail, stepping forward, offered to dance a minuet. This was received with such a roar of laughter that the poor snail, half frightened, half angry, drew in his horns and went to bed on the spot, and the dance was begun anew. By this time the Gnats and Midges, and some of the other flies, had left the ground and retired to enjoy a cool dance in the air. Two or three Spiders mounted up into the oak, and fastened threads to some of the branches, by which they dropped suddenly down among the dancers, and, seizing their partners round the waist, carried them screaming in among the leaves. So the fun and the noise became louder and louder. On the ground, under the bushes, among the branches of the trees, and in the air, the dancers bounded, skipped, laughed, sang, shouted, and flew in a way that had never been seen or heard of before. The merry old Bull-frog became quite absurd. He sang and roared like a lion; took up all the young insects in his arms and hugged them; tumbled over the other musicians, and, in short, did so many wild things that they were at length obliged to tie him to a paddock-stool, where they left him to enjoy himself.

Then, as evening gave way to the shadows of night,

Their watchman, the Glow-worm, came out with his light;

So home let us hasten, while yet we can see,

For no watchman is waiting for you or for me.

The sun went down at last, but still the dancers continued their sport under the old oak-tree, when suddenly a clear, beautiful light streamed across the turf. It was the Glow-worm’s light.

“How charming!” exclaimed the Butterfly. “It is such a sweet, subdued light.”

“Rather too much subdued,” growled the blundering Black Beetle, as he tripped over a twig and pulled his partner, a humble-bee, down with him; “couldn’t you shine a little brighter—eh?”

The Glow-worm shook his head. “Couldn’t give you another ray to save my life,” he said; “but if you send for a few of my friends, they will be happy to come and help me, no doubt.”

“A good suggestion,” said the Black Beetle, assisting his partner to rise.

“Oh, my poor frock,” cried the Humble-bee, gazing sadly at a long rent in the skirt.

“Never mind, let’s have at it again,” cried the Beetle, seizing her round the waist, and blundering on again in a furious gallop of his own invention.

“Whom shall I send for the Glow-worm’s relations?” muttered the Butterfly to herself.

“Send the Snail,” said a lively young Cricket, who had devoted himself to doing mischief during the whole evening.

“Peace, little goose,” replied the Butterfly, tapping the Cricket on the nose with her fan, and hastening towards the Grasshopper, who was still enthralled and convulsed by the bloated old Spider.

“Whom should we send, my dear!” said the Grasshopper, in reply to the Butterfly’s question; “the Fly footman, to be sure; and pray tell him to be smart about it, for I’ve been run down half-a-dozen times already by the dancers since the sun set. One lamp is too little for our ball-room. That blind Mole has run—ha! there he comes again. Look out!”

As he spoke, the Mole came bearing down towards them in a furious Portuguese waltz, with a horrified Dragonfly struggling in his arms.

The Grasshopper made a bound to get out of the way, but at that moment the lively young Cricket laid hold of his leg and held him fast. The consequence was that the Mole tumbled over him, fell on the top of the bloated Spider, and hit his head so violently on the breast of the Bull-frog that he stopped his noise immediately.

This sudden stoppage of the bass brought the other musicians to a stand, and as a matter of course stopped the dancing abruptly—with the exception of a deaf Squirrel, who had failed to find a partner, and who went on revolving slowly by himself as if nothing had happened.

“Dear me,” exclaimed everybody (except the Squirrel), “what has happened?”

“Oh, nothing worth mentioning,” said the Grasshopper, getting up with a limp. “You young rascal, what—why—there, take that.”

“Oh!” sobbed the young Cricket, pointing with a look of surprise at the Spider; “what a sight!”

He might well say so, for the bloated old Spider had been flattened out by the weight of the Mole to nearly twice her size, and was apparently quite dead. In great concern, the host and hostess ran to raise her.

“Are you hurt, dear?” asked the Butterfly, anxiously.

“Hurt!” exclaimed the Grasshopper, pushing her aside; “don’t you see she’s burst!”

“Oh me! I’m so sorry,” exclaimed the Mole, wringing his fore-paws.

At that moment there was a shout of eager expectation, for the Spider was seen to move. The Butterfly knelt at her side, and bending down, said tenderly—

“Tell me, dear, has he burst you?”

“N–no, n–not—qu–quite,” answered the Spider faintly; “I’m only f–flattened. Let some of you sq–squeeze m–my sides.”

Immediately a dozen of the young Crickets surrounded the old lady, and pressed her sides with all their might. This had the effect of raising her back a little, and enabling her to draw a good long breath, which speedily raised her up to her original size.

“There, I’m all right now,” she said in a cheerful voice; “I’m used to accidents of that sort, and they never leave any bad effects beyond a little stiffness of the lungs. Come, Grasshopper, I’ll finish that story. Get on with your dancing, good people.”

“Nobody inquires after me,” croaked the Bull-frog, rubbing his chest. “I had no idea a Mole’s head was so hard.”

“Have some mountain-dew,” said the Butterfly, gracefully handing him a blue-bell filled with the precious liquid. “It has been gathered on the Scottish hills by a native Bee, who has just arrived laden with heather-honey.”

The Bull-frog accepted the goblet, and drained it to the bottom.

“It is strong,” he said, coughing and smacking his lips.

“Oo ay,” observed the Scotch Bee; “it’s got the credit o’ bein’ a wee thing nippy.”

Under the influence of the dew the Bull-frog began to sing bass lustily. The other musicians chimed in. The dancers seized each other by waist and hand—or by tail and wing those that happened to have no waists or hands—and the ball was about to go on, when the Grasshopper shouted—

“Stop!”

“Your money or your life!” added the lively young Cricket.

“Silence, pert monkey!—Let us wait a few moments, my friends, for here come our lamps.”

As she spoke, a soft light was seen in the far distance gleaming upon the stems of the trees and steadily advancing.

“Your relations, Mr Glow-worm, I presume,” said the Butterfly in a sweet silvery voice. “It is so very kind of you to send for them, and so obliging in them to come. Really I cannot find words to express my gratitude.”

The countenance of the Glow-worm lighted up with pleasure at these words.

As the new-comers drew near, they appeared like a great galaxy of minute stars—as if a mass of the Milky-way had been cut off and hurled down to earth. There were several hundreds of them. As they approached, the whole forest lighted up; and when at last they descended upon the scene of the ball, and ranged themselves in a circle round the gay party, it seemed as if the sun himself had risen again to give them light—only the radiance was softer and more mysteriously tender than that of the sun!

Strong light has always an enlivening effect on creatures, whether human or otherwise. It cheered up the guests of Mrs Butterfly so much that they gave vent to an irresistible cheer; called for the music; and went on to dancing with more zest and energy than ever, insomuch that the attendant Glow-worms smiled to each other