STOtt,tNG. 



the Museum, and all Museum specimens bear the Museum label. In putting locality 

 one must be precise. The village, taluka, or town, the province, and " India " must all 

 be placed on the label, as a specimen labelled " Hyderabad" may be from one of two 

 places, and the entomologist in Europe or America to whom a specimen may go does 

 not necessarily know that these places are in India. 



Labelling like setting is done with a view to posterity, and collections now made 

 may be in a Museum for centuries and may go to any part of the world eventually. 



If the insect's name is to be on a label, it should be on a separate label of a distinc- 

 tive colour. There may then be three labels, the collector's name, the full details on a 

 collection label, and the name of the insect, with the name of the person responsible 

 for naming, followed by an exclamation point ! 



Storing. 



Insects after being pinned, labelled and set are stored in corked boxes. Boxes 

 must be air-tight and well corked and papered. 



Naphthalene or other "insectifuges" must be placed in the box. The difficulty in 

 India is not excluding insects so much as exclud- ,__ . _ 

 ing damp, and it is at this time that the value of 

 drying insects thoroughly is apparent. Any moisture 

 in the insect leads to mould when the atmosphere 

 round it is moist also, and the surest guard against 

 mould is thorough drying before placing in the store 

 box. 



It is unnecessary to pin all of a collection if there 

 are duplicates. Spare Lepidoptera are best kept in 

 " papers," spare Orthoptera in cylinders (fig. L), and 

 spare beetles in sawdust or bran. They can then be 

 relaxed and set if wanted for the pinned collection, or p IG> Q. 



are readily sent by post unpinned. The finished paper. 



Caterpillars, etc. 



Larvae of all kinds are best preserved in alcohol, alcoholic mixtures, or formalin. 

 Special methods must be used for obtaining laboratory material for dissection, etc. 

 Kectified spirit of 70 per cent, alcohol is the best form of spirit ; a mixture of alcohol, 

 spirit and glycerine preserves larvaa well and keeps them in a good flexible state. 

 Caterpillars are best blown with a larva blowing apparatus or over a spirit lamp and 

 small oven. A solution of 4 per cent, formalin in water is good for most larvae. A 

 handy way of storing larvse is in tubes, 3 inches long by 1 inch in diameter, with a 

 good cork. The label should be inside the tube written with hard pencil or good ink, 

 and it is useful to have the insect's number on the cork or on the outside for ready 

 reference. 



Arrangement of Collection. 



In making a collection of pinned insects, the difficulty lies in allowing for expan- 

 sion. However much room one allows for future specimens, one cannot be sure that 

 the arrangement will meet future needs simply because one cannot foresee what will 

 come in. It is perhaps best to allow at first for a small expansion only and then pre- 

 sently transfer the whole collection, leaving a large space for fresh accessions. Where 

 all families are collected, it is well to start a box for each order, expanding these orders 



