few
striking varieties, shown at rest or flying, as also the eggs and the
pupa-case, with a description of their economy affixed. A few
specimens of families or genera of insects shown thus is, to my mind,
of far greater importance, especially to museums, than mere
"collectors" are aware of.

Many works have been written on the collecting and preserving of these
orders, and especially of the Lepidoptera, vide Dr. Guard Knagg's work
on "Collecting Lepidoptera," Rev. Joseph Greene's "Insect Hunter's
Companion," and many others, including a little work on "Collecting
Butterflies and Moths" by myself.

Cruelty has been advanced as a crime specially to be laid to the
charge of the student in entomology; but some of the greatest workers
in that science have been ladies and clergymen, as also laymen of the
most humane and advanced scientific principles. A vast amount of
ignorant ideas, carefully nursed, are used as weapons against the
entomologist--the pet one of which is, that impalement of a living
insect through the head constitutes the sole aim and end of the
collector.

The fact is curiously inverse of this, for not only are insects
captured for purposes of study, but they are never impaled alive but
by a very ignorant or careless person. The lepidoptera (butterflies
especially) are very easy to kill, the simplest plan being to press
the thorax underneath the wing with the finger and thumb, which
instantly causes death. This is now superseded by the cyanide bottle,
of which anon.

It is singular how many people there are, even in the middle class,
who fail to recognise the fact that the egg (ovum) produces the
caterpillar or "grub" (larva), which, after a due season of
preparation, produces the chrysalis (pupa), which latter, lying
quiescent for a variable period, either in the ground or in other
situations favourable for its development, changes the last time to
the perfect insect (imago). This latter, if a butterfly or moth, does
not, as some people imagine, grow, but after it has unfolded its wings
on emergence to their full extent, it never becomes either larger or
smaller.

An insect, especially a butterfly, when seen by a youngster, is
usually chased in the most reckless fashion--jacket and cap, and even
sticks and stones, are pressed into the service, and the unfortunate
insect is usually a wreck before its fortunate (?) captor falls on top
of it.

I shall endeavour in the following pages to show the pro