ing the top lid. This style is also used for postal
boxes.

In very hot weather, or if the collector roves far afield, he will
find that many of his butterflies, if placed in the ordinary wooden
collecting box, will have become stiff before he can reach home to set
them. The remedy for this is a zinc box lined with cork, which latter
is soaked in water before commencing the day's collecting. These boxes
are made in various shapes and sizes. A handy one for the pocket is a
7 in. by 4 in, 2.5 in. deep, made of an oval shape if desired, corked
on top and bottom, the cork held by clips of zinc soldered to top and
bottom. For more extended operations a larger box will be required,
say, 13 in. by 9 in, 2.5 in. deep, with loops soldered to the back,
through which a strap passes to suspend it from the shoulders. These
boxes are lighter if made in tin, and the water does not corrode them
so rapidly if they are japanned inside as well as out.

"Postal boxes," by which entomologists transmit their captures to one
another, should be made of strong white pine, the tops and bottoms
nailed on, on the cross. They may open in the middle or at top, as
before mentioned, and further have a strengthening piece of thick cork
glued all over them outside and rasped down to the shape of a rough
oval.

Inside, the cork should be glued down on top and bottom; on this a few
small strips of the same cork running across with interstices left
between them. On top of this another sheet of cork, thus forming three
thicknesses, in which the pin is pushed as far as it will go. In the
case of large-bodied moths, or any valuable insects, it is as well to
support the abdomen with a layer of wool, cross-pinning the body on
either side to prevent it jarring or shifting. The box may then, for
greater security, be wrapped in a sheet of wool and tied up. The
address should not be written on the box, or the stamps affixed
thereto, but on a direction label, otherwise some vigorous post-office
sorter, or stamper, will convince you to your sorrow that he scorns
such paltry protection as is afforded by the triple alliance of wood,
cork, and wool.

The Germans cover the bottoms of a great many of their entomological
boxes with peat, and this certainly holds the long pins firmly in
transit; and it is also much less expensive than cork.

Foreign insects, when space is limited, may be sent home unpinned and
unset, their wings folded over their backs, and each speci