Here, too, they saw the first sign of active life in the valley: a flight of giant dragonflies skimming over the water.
"The Thing in the Attic"
James Benjamin Blish
In the garden, too, all was motionless but the thin jet of water, which danced up from the marble tank with a soft and fitful, but monotonous tinkle, while butterflies, dragonflies, bees, and beetles, whose hum she could not hear, seemed to circle round the flowers without a sound.
"The Complete Historical Romances of Georg Ebers"
Georg Ebers
The deep shade and glancing lights of this open copsewood were very pleasant; and as the horse tripped gaily up and down the little hills, and the sea murmur mingled with the rustle of the breeze, and a glint of white surf sometimes flashed through the greenery, and dragonflies and butterflies in suits of crimson and black velvet crossed the path continually like "living flashes" of light, I was reminded somewhat, though faintly, of windward Hawaii.
"Unbeaten-Tracks-in-Japan"
Bird, Isabella L. (Isabella Lucy)