SOLUTION OF CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE. 115 



out by Haworth, in speaking of the Oak Molh (Bombyx Quer* 

 CMS). " It is a frequent practice with the London Aurelians," 

 says he, te when they breed a female, of this and some other 

 day-flying species, to take her, whilst yet a virgin, into the 

 vicinity of woods, where, if the weather is favourable, she never 

 fails to attract a numerous train of males, whose only business 

 seems to be an incessant, rapid, and undulating flight, in search 

 of their unimpregnated females; one of which is no sooner 

 perceived, than they become so much enamoured of their fair 

 and chaste relation, as absolutely to lose all kind of fear for 

 their own personal safety, which, at other times, is effectually 

 secured by the reiterated evolutions of their strong and rapid 

 wings. So fearless, indeed, have I beheld them on these oc- 

 casions, as to climb up and down the sides of a cage which 

 contained the dear object of their eager pursuit, in exactly the 

 same hurrying manner as honey-bees, which have lost them- 

 selves, climb up and down the glasses of a window." 



CHAP. VII. 

 RECEIPTS 



FOR VARIOUS ARTICLES USED IN THE PRESERVATION AND 

 SETTING UP OF ANIMALS. 



SOLUTION OP CORROSIVE SUBLIMATE. 



Mr Watertons Method. 



PUT a good large tea-spoonful of well pounded corrosive 

 sublimate into a wine-bottle full of alcohol (spirits of wine). 

 Let it stand over night, and, the next morning, draw it off into 

 a clean bottle. When the solution is applied to black sub- 

 stances, and little white particles are perceived on them, it 

 will be necessary to make it weaker, by the addition of some 

 alcohol. 



A black feather, clipped in the solution, and then dried, will 



