Xocturnp.l Moth flying by Moonlight. 



CHAPTER III. 



ON COLLECTING INSECTS. 



LEPIDOPTERA fly mostly in the night : when the air is warm 

 and the sky serene, and the moon is lighting up the fringes 

 of the clouds, the downy moths wing their way from the 

 bushes and crevices where they have spent the hours of 

 daylight, and wander in the woods and over the meadows, 

 each bent on the task of continuing its kind, or seeking 

 food in the nectaries of flowers. Hundreds may be seen 

 fluttering round the blossoms of brambles, ivy, martagon 

 lily, honeysuckle, and jasmine. But although these noc- 

 turnal wanderers delight in the moonbeams, some of them 

 vaulting in graceful aerial dances round the tops of trees, 

 it is not on such nights that the collector will meet with 



