Then the gathering days of October—­they were the best days of all!  Like a bloom-outlined vegetable bed, the goldenrod and ironwort, in gaudy border, filled the fence corners of the big fields.  A misty haze hung in the air, because the Indians were burning the prairies to round up game for winter.  The cawing of the crows, the chatter of blackbirds, and the piping bob-whites, sounded so close and so natural out there, while the crowing cocks of the barnyard seemed miles away and slightly unreal.  Grown up and important, I sat on a board laid across the wagon bed, and guided the team of matched greys between the rows of shocks, and around the ‘pie-timber’ as my brother Leander called the pumpkins while father and the boys opened the shocks and husked the ears.  How the squirrels scampered to the woods and to the business of storing away the hickory nuts that we could hear rattling down every frosty morning!  We hurried with the corn; because as soon as the last shock was in, we might take the horses, wagon, and our dinner, and go all day to the woods, where we gathered our winter store of nuts.  Leander would take a gun along, and shoot one of those saucy squirrels for the little sick mother.

Last came the November night, when the cold had shut us in.  Then selected ears that had been dried in the garret were brought down, white for `rivel’ and to roll things in to fry, and yellow for corn bread and mush.  A tub full of each was shelled, and sacked to carry to the mill the following day.  I sat on the floor while father and the boys worked, listening to their talk, as I built corncob castles so high they toppled from their many stories.  Sometimes father made cornstock fiddles that would play a real tune.  Oh! the pity of it that every little child cannot grow, live, learn and love among the corn.  For the caterpillars never stopped the fun, even the years when they were most numerous.

The eggs laid by my female never hatched, so I do not know this caterpillar in its early stages from experience, but I had enough experience with it in my early stages, that I do not care if I never raise one.  No doubt it attains maturity by the same series of moults as the others, and its life history is quite similar.  The full-fed caterpillars spin among the leaves on the ground, and with their spines in mind, I would much prefer finding a cocoon, and producing a moth from that stage of its evolution.

The following season I had the good fortune to secure a male and female Io at the same time and by persistence induced them to pose for me on an apple branch.  There was no trouble in securing the male as I desired him, with wings folded showing the spots, lining and flushing of colour.  But the female was a perverse little body and though I tried patiently and repeatedly she would not lower her wings full width.  She climbed around with them three-fourths spread, producing the most beautiful effect of life, but failing to display her striking markings.  This is the one disadvantage in photographing moths from life.  You secure lifelike effects but sometimes you are forced to sacrifice their wonderful decorations.