Chapter I: Preface

The Golden Butterfly, which gives a name to this novel, was seen by an English traveller, two years ago, preserved as a curiosity in a mining city near Sacramento, where it probably still remains. This curious freak of Nature is not therefore an invention of our own. To the same traveller--Mr. Edgar Besant--we are indebted for the description on which is based our account of Empire City.

The striking of oil in Canada in the manner described by Gilead P. Beck was accomplished--with the waste of millions of gallons of the oil, for want of casks and buckets to receive it, and with the result of a promise of almost boundless wealth--by a man named Shaw, some ten years ago. Shaw speculated, we believe; lost his money, and died in poverty.

Names of great living poets and writers have been used in this book in connection with a supposed literary banquet. A critic has expressed surprise that we have allowed Gilead Beck's failure to appreciate Browning to stand as if it were our own. Is a writer of fiction to stop the action of his story in order to explain that it is his character's opinion and not his own, that he states? And it surely is not asking too much to demand of a critic that he should consider first of all the consistency of a character's actions or speeches. Gilead Beck, a man of no education and little reading, but of considerable shrewdness, finds Browning unintelligible and harsh. What other verdict could be expected if the whole of Empire City in its palmiest days had been canvassed?

Moreover, we have never, even from that great writer's most ardent admirers, heard an opinion that he is either easy to read, or musical. The compliments which Mr. Beck paid to the guests who honoured his banquet are of course worded just as he delivered them.

Gilead Beck's experiences as an editor are taken--with a little dressing--from the actual experiences of a living Canadian journalist.

From their Virginian home Jack Dunquerque and Phillis his wife send greetings to those who have already followed their fortunes. She only wishes us to add that Mr. Abraham Dyson was right, and that the Coping Stone of every woman's education is Love. Most people know this, she says, from reading: but she never did read; and the real happiness is to find it out for yourself.

W. B.
J. R.

_March, 1877._

PROLOGUE
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIV.
CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVII.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CHAPTER XXX.
CHAPTER XXXI.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
CHAPTER XXXV.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
CHAPTER XL.
CHAPTER XLI.
CHAPTER XLII.
CHAPTER XLIII.
CHAPTER XLIV.
CHAPTER XLV.
CHAPTER THE LAST.

THE GOLDEN BUTTERFLY.