INSE CTS PERF UMER Y 551 



Collecting and Preserving Insects 



Flying insects are caught in a net made of mosquito-bar, or cheese- 

 cloth after the fashion of the minnow-net. The material is made into 

 a bag about a yard deep, and about a foot in width at the top. The 

 opening is fastened upon a wire hoop, which is secured to a pole 

 as a broomstick. Insects are killed by placing them in a " cyanide- 

 bottle." This is prepared by placing "two or three lumps of cyanide 

 of potassium the size of a quail's egg in a wide-mouthed glass bottle, 

 covering the lumps with a layer of fine sawdust held in place by snugly 

 fitted pieces of pasteboard. The insects are quickly killed by the fumes 

 of the poison. Keep the bottle corked. The cyanide is very poisonous, 

 and the fumes should not be inhaled. Bugs and beetles, etc., may be 

 pinned and mounted as soon as they are dead. It is customary to pin 

 beetles through the right wing-cover, and bugs as squash-bugs 

 through the triangular space between the wings. Butterflies and 

 moths should have the wings carefully spread. This is done by placing 

 on a " setting-board." This apparatus is a little trough with a crack 

 at the bottom. The sides of the trough are made of thin bits of 

 board, three or four inches wide and a foot or more long. These sides 

 have very little slant. The crack in the bottom of the trough is left 

 about a half-inch wide, and it is covered beneath with a strip of cork. 

 The body of the insect is now placed lengthwise the crack, a pin is 

 thrust through the thorax or middle division of the insect, into the 

 cork, and the wings are laid out on the sides of the trough. The 

 wings are held in place by strips of cardboard or mica pinned over 

 them. Take care not to stick the pins through the wings. In about 

 two weeks the insects will be dry and stiff. 



Insects must be kept in tight boxes to keep other insects from de- 

 vouring them. Cigar-boxes are good. Tight boxes with glass covers 

 are generally used by collectors. Place sheets of cork in the bottom 

 of the box to receive the pins. If insects attack the specimens, expose 

 them in a tight box to vapors of bisulfid of carbon or benzine. 



Larvae, and some other soft bodies, may be preserved in 95 per 



cent alcohol. 



Making Perfumery at Home 



PERMANENT ATTAR OR OTTO OF ROSES (Ellwanger). The roses 

 employed should be just blown, of the sweetest-smelling kinds, 



