FIRST HINTS ON COLLECTING BUTTERFLIES. 121 



tie a bag of muslin tightly round it and leave them there till they pupate or 

 have eaten all the leaves. This process is called slieviog. 



The keeping of pupa) or chrysalises in this country presents none of the 

 difficulties experienced at home because the perfect insects emerge after a few 

 weeks and there is no question of keeping them through the winter or in 

 varying temperatures. 



The only advice I have to give is — do not touch them. 



I have suggested above that if the collector comes across the larva of any 

 species which has not been previously described, he should send a record of 

 it to the Society. The larvse of I think all the species there will be any 

 occasion to allude to in this series are familiar, but as a collector in any of the 

 richer parts of the country might discover the previously unknown early 

 stages of quite a number of species, it would be as well to give an outline of 

 how to describe a larva, because a description of one which is not in accordance 

 with the customary scientific methods is generally more or less unintelligible. 



A larva is either smooth, hairy, spiniferous or tuberculous. If hairy it should 1 

 be stated whether the hairs occur in tufts or not. If in tufts it will generally 

 be found that those on the 2nd segment (or first excluding the head) and on 

 the last, differ in size and colour from the rest. The same may be said of 

 spines or tubercles. The ground colour should be stated first and then the 

 colour of the tufts or spines and the colour of the head. On each segment 

 above the legs are small trachse or spiracles which are the breathing apparatus 

 of the insect and are generally distinctively marked, and if so the colours 

 should be described. 



All other markings are generally linear and may occur in the following way : 

 A central line down the back, called the dorsal line, a line or band through the 

 spiracles on either side called the spiracular lines, narrow lines bordering the 

 spiracular called the supra spiracular and subspiracular, and between these and 

 the dorsal line two other pairs, the upper called the subdorsal and the lower 

 the lateral. In any description it is extremely important to call these lines 

 by their right names, and as they are generally not all present, the describer 

 must judge for himself which those present actually are from their position.. 

 The dorsal and spiracular offer no difficulty and these are the ones most nearly 

 universal. 



The ground colour may also be spotted, and if the spots are few and conspi- 

 cuous, the number, arrangement and colour on each segment should be stated., 



16 



