In Death of a Naturalist, which line expresses the speaker's childhood fascination with the flax-dam and its inhabitants?

• A. All year the flax-dam festered
• B. There were dragon-flies, spotted butterflies, but best of all was the warm thick slobber of frogspawn
• C. I would fill jampotfuls; Miss Walls would tell us how the daddy frog was called a bullfrog
• D. they were yellow in the sun and brown in rain

Answer: (B)

The line that best captures the speaker’s childhood fascination with the flax-dam and its inhabitants shows a vivid, personal delight in what lives there. It lists dragon-flies and butterflies, then trumpets frogspawn as “best of all” with the sensory image “the warm thick slobber of frogspawn.” That combination—a ranking of creatures and a tactile, almost affectionate description of the frogspawn—pulls the reader into a child’s wonder at the living world in the flax-dam. The imagery is concrete and immediate, not just about the place, but about the creatures within it, highlighting the sense of curiosity and delight that defines the speaker’s early experience.

Other lines touch on the setting or on childhood activities, but they do not convey that same immediate sense of wonder toward the inhabitants.