TRAPPING AN EMPEROK. 67 



' LATEST INTELLIGENCE. 



" Colias Hyale and Edusa have both just been captured near 

 Bognor. Further particulars in our next." 



Further particulars in our next! One could almost fancy it 

 was the first intimation of some fearful railway accident ; and it 

 certainly does look like being " serious upon trifles." Still, the 

 Clouded Yellows are fine butterflies, and those who know them, 

 and how difficult they are in some years to obtain, will not be 

 surprised at a little enthusiasm. One of the greatest prizes 

 amongst our native butterflies is Apatura Iris, which occurs 

 in the woods of the south. This is the insect of which Crabbe 

 sings 



" Above the sovereign oak a sovereign skims, 

 The purple emp'ror, strong in wing and limbs ;" 



and, unfortunately for the collector, it is high up above the oaks 

 and quite out of reach that the Emperor is most frequently seen. 

 Like some other imperial personages, however, Iris is said to 

 have a gross appetite, and has at times been captured while feast- 

 ing on garbage by the side of muddy pools ; and a case is re- 

 corded in which a collector captured no less than eighty of these 

 insects, within a few days, by the simple expedient of nailing 

 against the side of a house, in a wood where they occur, a bit of 

 rabbit-skin and the wing of a bird ! One would hardly have 

 thought that such a commonplace device would have so gone 

 to the heart of an emperor. 



In collecting Butterflies, the course is easy enough, the col- 

 lector having the daylight in his favour. But how shall he 

 obtain the Moths, which, for the most part, fly only at night ? 

 Well, in the first place, he can collect the caterpillars, or dig 

 for the pupse, which he can do by daylight, and then rear his 

 specimens, and so obtain them in a much finer condition than 

 any he can get by other means. But the Moths themselves 

 may readily be captured. The ingenuity of collectors has not 

 only overcome the difficulty which the nocturnal habits of most 

 of the tribe interposed, but has rendered it even easier to obtain 

 the night-fliers than those that flit about by day. The first and 

 principal device employed is that of " sugaring." The collector, 

 armed with a mixture of sugar and beer, goes to the woods or 



