44 Messrs. W. L. Distant and W. B. Piyer on 



One noticeable feature about collecting in the tropics is 

 the very few larvge seen, and it soon becomes apparent to 

 the observer that only those species can exist which have 

 some very special means of protection or of concealment — the 

 latter being tlie safeguard of many more species tlian the 

 former, which accounts for the very few larvae found. The 

 enemies of larva are so numerous that it really seems 

 wonderful how any can escape at all with the numbers of 

 spiders, ants, wasps, iclmeumons, mantises, &c. continually 

 searching every leaf and twig in hopes of prey. If England 

 by a miracle could have these insect-destroyers moved over 

 to it for a couple of years in the same numbers in which they 

 exist in the tropics, the consequence would be the entire 

 blotting-out of the greater part of our insect-fauna. It is rather 

 curious, however, that some of these exterminators are them- 

 selves in turn subjected to the most ruthless persecution ; and 

 nothing is more curious than to see the huge hunting-spider 

 common in houses hunted by a small Chryseis^ which, after 

 a more or less exciting and lengthy chase^ generally manages 

 to settle on its back, sting it, and then drag it off to furnish 

 food for its young in the future ; the " come into my parlour 

 said the spider to the fly " poem of one's youth suffers a 

 rude reversal. 



It is chiefly in the larva stage that butterflies suffer from 

 their enemies. Moths are ruthlessly eaten by birds by day 

 and by bats at night ; but I have never once in a twenty years' 

 experience seen a butterfly taken by a bird. 



The number of moths in the tropics is enormous ; the best 

 way to get a good idea of them is, if time and money afford, to 

 make a felling in the forest, the further away from the nearest 

 clearing the better, and there have a hut erected : native huts 

 usually run up in a peak to the top of the roof, without any 

 ceiling ; but if you like to put a ceiling of white cloth over 

 the room so much the better ; and at night a bright light will 

 attract a simply uncountable number of moths, and on every 

 night that is not too bright tlie same thing will occur until 

 the bats find their way over from the nearest clearings. In 

 a clearing frequented by bats scarcely any moths come to 

 light at all. In a house in a new clearing in the forest I have 

 seen the floor and table in the morning simply covered with 

 the wings of moths which have flown in and settled on the 

 roof inside, where they have been caught and eaten, principally 

 by hunting-spiders. 



One thing the collector may feel pretty sure about — he will 

 see a great many more species than he will catch. Most of 

 the butterflies in the tropics fly very fast ; many of them fly 



