628 MANUAL OF NATURAL HISTORY. 



insects placed in the bottle. For Moths the chloro- 

 form-bottle is almost indispensable, and a more than 

 ordinary wide-mouthed one should be selected for 

 the purpose. 



Add to these things, forceps, a pocket lens, a 

 lantern with safety oil-cap and bull's-eye reflector 

 for " mottling," a setting-needle, which may be made 

 by forcing the blunt end of a common needle into 

 a piece of wood ; a small and sharp-pointed pair of 

 scissors for opening large insects, phials, chip boxes, 

 braces made of slips of card-board, or, where they 

 can be conveniently used, slips of glass, for extend- 

 ing the wings of moths ; if the collector is for any 

 time stationary, breeding-cages might be employed 

 for rearing larvae and watching the transformation of 

 such insects as may be procured in their early stages. 

 A cage may be made for this purpose two feet in 

 length, the same in height, and from eight inches to 

 a foot in breadth ; the lower part, to the height of 

 five or six inches, must be of wood, to contain earth 

 for such larvae as bury themselves previously to 

 their metamorphosis, and the upper part covered 

 with gauze stretched over a frame. It may be di- 

 vided into several compartments, each provided 

 with a door. The entomologist's equipment will 

 now only want the setting-box. This, especially in 

 tropical countries, should be covered, to exclude de- 

 structive foes, but at the same time so as to allow 

 a current of air to pass through it and over the 

 insects which are placed in it to dry. To accomplish 

 this, a frame must be made eighteen inches long, 



