BUTTERFLY HAUNTS. 3S 



The pins here mentioned, which are an important 

 item among butterfly-collecting requisites, are of a 

 peculiar manufacture very small-headed, long and 

 thin, but strong. Any good London dealer will supply 

 them on application, or send them by post into the 

 country. 



Armed with the above simple paraphernalia, viz. 

 net to catch, boxes and pins to contain and detain, the 

 insect hunter may sally forth on any fine summer's day, 

 with a pretty sure prospect of sport, and the chance, at 

 least, of a prize. Much depends, however, on the 

 choice of a day, and the nature of the locality that io 

 to form the hunting ground. 



As to weather, it must be remembered that winged 

 insects have a great objection to face a north, or north- 

 east wind, during the prevalence of which you wiil 

 probably find hardly one stirring, however prolific the 

 locality may at other times be. 



Butterflies, as a rule, do not appear to be at all in- 

 fluenced by an eye for the picturesque and romantic 

 in the choice of their favourite haunts. Often have I 

 been disappointed in this way, finding a delicious spot, 

 basking in sunshine, and bedight with all manner of 

 flowers such as a butterfly loves, yet with scarcely a 

 stray butterfly to enliven it ; while, on the other hand, 

 a piece of the most unpromising flat waste land will 

 be all alive with insect beauty. Those, for example, 

 who would see those splendid creatures, the Swallow- 

 tail butterfly and the large Copper (if this exists with 

 us at all now), must go to the dreary fen districts that 

 form their almost exclusive haunts. 



It is, in fact, very hard to say what influences bring 

 a swarm of butterflies together, to populate one parti- 

 cular spot, to the utter neglect of others close at hand, 

 and, to all appearance, just as eligible. 



Some species are most remarkable for their excessive 

 Localness (as it is called), or, limiting their range to an ex- 

 ceedingly small circumscribed space ; so much so, that 

 some rare species have been known to haunt just on? 



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