18tl3.J 159 



COUETICB'S BEEEDINQ CAaE, WITH VAEIATIONS. 

 BX H. G. KNAGGS, M.D., P.L.S. 



In my early collecting days my good old friend, the late Mr, 

 Henry Doubleday, showed me a muslin-topped glass cylinder, resting 

 on a pan of damp sand, which he was using as a breeding cage. This 

 seemed to me to be an immense advance on those hideous things like 

 meat safes so much in vogue amongst " Aurelians " in the eighteenth 

 century, which are not even yet extinct. Some time aftervvards, 

 having dealings with a glass shade merchant, he informed me that the 

 cut-off bottoms or " rims " went into the waste bin under the cutting 

 board ; whereupon it was there and then arranged that he was to save 

 all he could for me at a fair price. By this means scores upon scores 

 of them came into my hands, and were quickly converted into breeding 

 cages for my friends and self by the addition of the perforated plate 

 with muslin stage and top. 



Larva rearing thus became so pleasant and instructive, the process 

 of changing food, &c., so easy, the cages so cleanly, and the breeding 

 so successful, that considerable impetus was given to this most fasci- 

 nating branch of practical entomology. 



But, alas ! the time came when some other utilitarian found a 

 more profitable use for these rims, and prices consequently went up 

 to a prohibitive figure. It was then that my friend, Mr. J. L. Courtice, 

 set his inventive brain to work to supply the deficiency, and succeeded 

 so well, that at a very trifling cost he produced a cage having many 

 advantages over the original, inasmuch, as the glasses can always be 

 procured and of any desired size, while, owing to its square shape, it 

 occupies less room, and further, can be made to pack safely into a 

 small compass for the purposes of travelling or transmission. This is 

 how it is done. 



Take four pieces of glass, each of exactly equal size (Mr. Cour- 

 tice's fancy is three and a half inches by seven) ; these can be pretty 

 easily cut by an amateur with a decent diamond, a little practice, and 

 English material ; but any glass cutter will do it for a nominal reward. 

 Of course, if the larva rearer does not mind his cages being all of a 

 size, he can purchase, at an exceedingly low price, foreign glass ready 

 cut for horticultural purposes. 



Next take a board of deal, mahogany or other wood, half an inch 

 thick when planed, of any length or width, and with a " three-eighths 

 filletster plane " take out a rabbet, or rebate, Fa down to within an 

 eighth of an inch of the lower surface, and saw off the length an 



