March 1887.] 



ANT> OOLOGIST. 



47 



Two mu(th care cannot be exercised iu remov- 

 ing the larv;e or pup;e from their places, for 

 nothing is so fatal to success here, as bungling 

 work. The chrysalis of butterflies and the co- 

 coons of spinning moths should not be pulled 

 from their places, but be carefully disengaged 

 by clipping oft" a [jart of the substance to which 

 they are attached. 



These pup;e should be kept in a moist atmos- 

 phere, but not in a soil where dampness of the 

 pupa is continuous. A jar in which is a few 

 inches of silver sand wet in March, will contain 

 moisture enough in May for their healthful de- 

 velopment. They should be placed on the sand, 

 not in it. I have found that the larv;e of sphin- 

 gidiiB placed in three inches of silver sand wet 

 in the fall, needed no further attention to hatch 

 in the spring. I have had the l)est of success 

 by this mode, which seems to many [)articular 

 entomologists very shiftless. 



This fall and spring collecting of pup;e (for 

 October is as propitious for it as April), results 

 often in the capture of rare moths and gives the 

 collector beautiful specimens of moths, which 

 caught in the net are always more or less faded, 

 worn or broken. 



We would advise entomologists to make an 

 ett'ort in this direction. The finds are not large, 

 but the result is most always gratifying. 



Collecting on the Amazon. 



As soon as the ofHcer of the i)ort had cleared 

 the vessel, I jumped ashore, butterfly net in 

 hand, to make a preliminary examination of my 

 new collecting ground. 



The town consisted entirely of onc-stoi'ied 

 houses with mud walls, (the better ones also 

 plastered and whitewashed) and palm-thatched 

 roofs. The houses ranged along wide but ex- 

 tremely muddy streets, which crossed each 

 other at right angles. The reader can form an 

 idea of the size of this, the largest town on the 

 Peruvian Amazon, if I state that when standing 

 on a corner, the woods could be seen at the ends 

 of the streets in every direction. The streets 

 were choked with weeds and so swampy that it 

 was necessary to hug the walls of the houses 

 closely, where the overhanging eaves protected 

 the ground from th<' rain. All kinds of semi- 

 domestic animals were roaming about, conspic- 

 uous among them large hogs, which, curious to 

 relate, had here ab.indoned their usual custom 

 of wallowing in the mud, and taken possession 



of the scanty dry space along the sides of 

 the buildings. Narrow wooden bridges were 

 thrown across the streets at the crossings, as it 

 would otherwise have been impossible to get to 

 the other side. 



It did not take nie long to find a path towards 

 the forest, but I found I had some distance to 

 go before I reached it. For over a mile I w;ilk- 

 ed through open country with i)atches of dried- 

 up looking trees, which had once been under 

 cultivation. It proved to be ver^' poor collect- 

 ing, and I saw only a few of the very connnon- 

 est insects flying about. Even when I had 

 reached the thick forest, I found all kinds of 

 insects scarce, but most of those I saw were 

 diff"erent from those 1 had taken on the lower 

 Amazon. 



Lepidoptera especially were rare, and some- 

 times I would walk on for a (juarter of an hour 

 without so much as seeing a butterfly. 



The walking was extremely tiresome and dif- 

 ficult; it was muddy and wet everywhere, and 

 at short intervals, brooks or j)Ools had to be 

 crossed on slippery logs, where a false step 

 would plunge one into the soft mud, perhaps 

 up to the waist. — as I found on several occas- 

 ions, where I tried to keep my eyes on some 

 rare butterfly and the {)ath at the same time. 



One of my first captures was a very pretty 

 little butterfly, Erychia Mcliixicnfi. The upper 

 surface of the wings are black, with a crimson 

 bar through them ; while the hind ones, which 

 are prolonged into a l)road, blunt tail, have an 

 additional dash of the same color. Beneath, it 

 is a deep iridescent blue, with a red spot on the 

 inner margin of each wing. The blue is broken 

 by a black band through the middle of the 

 wing, and in certain lights changes to an in- 

 tense green. I often saw this butterfly settled 

 in the path or on the shrubbery, but its motions 

 were so sudden and rapid that it was quite a 

 trial to keep sight of it. Even when I suc- 

 ceeded in capturing one, it frequently beat it- 

 self to pieces before I could kill it. In the 

 female the tails are more strongly marked, and 

 the markings of the wings are of an orange-red. 

 On the under surface it lacks the brilliant blue 

 of the male, being the same as the upper side, 

 except that the markings are stronger. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



The A. O. U. and the Amateurs. 



Editor Ornithologist and Oologist, Sir:— In the 

 December number of the O., and O., I find a letter, 

 with tiie above title, from Dr. W. DeForrest Xortli- 

 rup whicli contiiins statements clearly showing that 



