Feb., '02] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 53 



substances with which the bodies must be filled are not soluble 

 in ether. Ordinary brown shellac is the handiest thing I know 

 for refixing the bodies. In the case of a badly-greased speci- 

 men total immersion is the only remedy I have seen tried. 

 Though I always clean a greasy abdomen of a good specimen 

 in my series, however common or ordinary in type, it is hardly 

 worth 'while treating any but really valuable forms if the 

 grease has once extended to the wings, except, of course, as 

 an experiment. The most successful result of total immersion, 

 in my experience, was in a unique Cossus. It had greased, to 

 use a vulgar expression, "from its teeth to its toe nails;" 

 but after repeated and lengthy baths in methylated ether — I 

 really forget how often I changed the ether — became as clean 

 and fresh-looking as the day it was taken. It still remains a 

 unique, and really no one not in the swim would ever suspect 

 it had been soaked. I recently removed grease completely 

 from the wings of a dozen or more specimens of Argyjmis 

 edwardsii and A. halcyone by merely dipping them (after re- 

 moving the abdomen) for a. fezv seconds only in ether, and then 

 waving them through the air till dry. In some species, how- 

 ever, notably in Cucullia and its allied genus Rancora, once 

 the grease has extended to the wings, I am baffled. There 

 seems to be carried with the grease that sticky substance pre- 

 viously mentioned, insoluble in ether. I have tried total im- 

 mersion first in warm water — '' an original method," I thought 

 to myself. It seems likely to remain original, as the result is 

 scarcely to be recommended. It certainly removes the trouble, 

 but the cure is every bit as bad and more ' ' widely distributed ' ' 

 than the disease, and subsequent ether baths completely fail to 

 renovate the specimen, which has evermore a plastered and 

 crumpled appearance. The day may come when I may wish 

 to clean a particularly valuable though badly-greased specimen, 

 and I cannot help thinking that there must be some more suc- 

 cessful method than the above. Pure distilled water might 

 meet with good results ; I have never tried it. 



I write to learn rather than to teach, and trust some one will 

 come forward and tell us, through the pages of the NEWS, of 

 some better method of renovating greased specimens, -and also 

 of their experience with cabinet pests. 



