Page 296 : BUTTE CITY — BUTTERFLY
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flour, planing and silk mills, and extensive glass factories, whose motive power is derived from natural gas. Butler’s largest industry is a steel-car works employing 5,000 men; it also has a large oil-refinery and furniture-factory. Four lines of railroads pass through it. Population, 20,728.
Butte City, Mont., the capital of Silverbow County, is situated in the southwestern portion of the state, in the midst of a rich mineral region. It is the largest city in the state, and has five lines of railway. It derives its name from the Big Butte, a high mountain peak in the vicinity of the city. The city has fine public buildings, including court house, opera house, high school and many churches, hospitals and a complete system of public and parochial schools. It has a public library containing 30,000 volumes; also a public law-library. Is well supplied with water, and the facilities of electric lighting and gas and a very efficient street car system. The ore production of the Butte district, chiefly copper, approaches $60,000,000 per year, and is rapidly increasing. The population of the city proper by census of 1910 is 39,165, but Butte, inclusive of its suburbs has about 70,000 people.
Butter, the fatty part of [[../Milk|milk]], obtained from milk or cream by churning. Milk is made up of three parts, the cheesy portion or curd, the whey or watery part which contains milk-sugar, and the butter; and when examined by the microscope is seen to consist of a number of little globules of fat floating in a clear liquid. These globules collect and form cream after the milk has stood a few hours, and the process of butter making or churning is simply to cause the particles of fat to come together in a mass. After churning, the butter is washed and salt added to prevent the forming of certain acids which give old butter its rancid taste. Besides the common method of churning, butter is made in parts of South America, by jolting the cream, which is put in gourds or skin bags, on the backs of donkeys, or, as in Buenos Ayres, by dragging it in a skin-bag behind a galloping horseman. Indeed, butter is said to have been discovered by carrying milk in skin bottles on camels, in which the butter was made by the jolting. It takes about two quarts of cream to make one pound of butter. Artificial butter, called oleomargarine, is now made from beef-fat.
Buttercup, a well-known wild-flower, member of the Crowfoot family. It was brought to this country from Europe and is generally distributed throughout Canada and the [[../United States of America, The|United States]]. In the north, Buttercups are especially abundant and handsome. Their season of blooming is from May to September, localities preferred by them meadows, fields, roadsides and grassy places. English children call Buttercups, King-Cups or Gold-Cups. [[../Shakespeare, William|Shakespeare]] speaks of them as “cuckoo-buds of yellow hue,” and says they “do paint the meadows with delight.” There are many kinds, but the first comer is the Bulbous Buttercup, blooming early in May, lasting till the end of June; a small, erect plant of meadow and roadside, the blossoms golden-yellow, leaves bright green. The Meadow Buttercup grows in field and by roadside, sometimes rises as high as three feet, and blooms from May to August, occasionally until frost, the flower, pale yellow. The Swamp or Marsh Buttercup, dots with gold low meadow lands, blooming from April to July, its blossoms huge and satiny. Children are warned not to bite Buttercup stem and leaf, as a blister might result. Buttercups, if eaten in large quantities by cows, might prove poisonous, but the acrid taste is too disagreeable for more than a few nibbles.
Butterfly, the common name for a group of day-flying insects. Butterflies and [[../Moths|moths]] form a natural order of the class Insecta and are so closely related that they should be considered together. Nearly every boy knows that a sort of dust sticks to the fingers after handling butterflies and moths. This dust, examined under the microscope is seen to be made up of minute scales, with which the wings of these insects are covered, and this circumstance gives them the name of the scaly-winged (Lepidoptera). It is a common mistake to suppose that the moths are all plain and somber in color, while butterflies are more brilliant. The group of moths, on the contrary, embraces some of the largest and most beautiful members of the order. The butterflies are day fliers, their antennæ are knobbed at the end, and they fold their wings vertically over the back when at rest. The moths fly mainly at night; their antennæ are of various forms; and their wings are seldom elevated in repose.
Butterflies and moths make an attractive cabinet. A collection can be started with very little trouble. The requirements are: a net spread over a hoop attached to a cane or pole; a killing fluid, as chloroform
Image: BUTTERFLY
