234 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



The Club met again at 3 p. m. Mr. Fletcher gave an account of his 

 expeditions to Nepigon, Lake Superior, in search of the eggs of butterflies. 

 Very little is known, he stated, regarding the early stages of many of our 

 diurnals ; of even so common a species as Pamphila cernes they were 

 unknown. In 1885, Prof. Macoun, of the Geological Survey of Canada, 

 collected specimens at Nepigon of a new butterfly, which was named after 

 him by Mr. W. H. Edwards as Chionobas Macounii. In 1886 and 1887, 

 Mr. Fletcher went to Nepigon in search of this insect, travelling about 

 1,500 miles on each occasion, but without success. This year he went 

 again, early in July, accompanied by Mr. S. H. Scudder, of Cambridge. 

 Mass. ; on the first day after their arrival they caught five males ; the next 

 day nine females were caught and caged ; from these they obtained about 

 250 eggs. The egg is larger than and quite different from that of C. Jutta, 

 which has been found near Quebec, and bred by Mr. Fyles. Mr. Fletcher 

 also obtained eggs of Jutta at Ottawa, and reared the larvae from them ; the 

 eggs were laid on July 1st, and hatched on the 16th ; those of Macounii 

 were laid on the 12th and hatched on the 27th. At Nepigon, he and Mr. 

 Scudder obtained the eggs of 14 species out of 16 that they caged. He 

 then gave a full and most interesting account of the methods of capturing, 

 caging and treating butterflies in order to obtain their eggs, and mentioned 

 that he had received very valuable information and aid from Mr. Scudder 

 in the matter. The simplicity of the apparatus employed deserves men- 

 tion : " Cages for all small species can be made in a few minutes by cut- 

 ting off the top and bottom of a tomato can, and then fastening a piece of 

 netting over one end, either by slipping an elastic band over it, or tying it 

 with a piece of string. The female is then placed in this over a growing 

 plant of the species that the larvae are known to feed upon. These cages 

 had answered well for all the skippers which feed on grass, and the small 

 Argynnides. For such species as lay their eggs on the foliage of shrubs 

 or trees bags had to be tied over living branches, care being taken that 

 the leaves were not crowded up, but that they should stand out freely, so 

 that the female could lay, if such were her habit, upon either the upper or 

 lower side, or on the edge of the leaves. In this way eggs were obtained 

 of Nisoniades icelus and Papilio turnus. Another cage for insects which 

 lav upon low plants, and which is easily constructed, is made by cutting 

 two flexible twigs and bending them into the shape of two arches which 

 are put one over the other at right angles with the ends pushed into the 

 ground ; over the pent-house thus formed a piece of gauze is placed, and 



