Recently there has been a small revival of the odd early twentieth century writer Robert Chambers, especially his “King in Yellow” a sort of pre- Lovecraft, atmospheric, semi- horror tale with a fin- de- siecle air about it– think old Howard crossed with Beardsley or Wilde, though not as good.
I saw a battered copy of his 1904 In Search of the Unknown, supposedly about its narrator’s search for and discovery of extinct or legendary beasts, and picked it up, hoping for a cryptozoological version of Lovecraft. Besides, it had a cool cover:
It was appallingly bad; overwritten, hysterical, without the vaguest notion of storytelling, animals real or imaginary, or far places. But in the front was a short poem, rather in the school of Kipling, that was worth the few pennies– not great literature, and I am not sure I agree with its last line, but– well, see for yourself:
"Chloroforming butterflies" was clearly destined to be a line of poetry from before the dawn of time. I'm only displeased that someone else found it before I did.
Takes me back to those summer days, long ago when no Girl Scout or Jr Conservationist worth her salt was without a straight pin mounted collection of butterflies, and the occasional fruit jar of pond water with tad poles swimming oblivious to their fate. I wonder how many tad poles survive to become frogs?