and other Suhurhan Gardens, 



473 



houses it may be kept under by toads ; but in a house full of chinks, 

 crannies, and crevices, toads cannot get at it. Immersion in water, for 

 several hours, we know, from experience, will not kill this insect; neither 

 will watering it with lime water injure it. Strong tobacco water will 

 prove poisonous; but this is not easy of application. The only effectual 

 mode of destruction appears to be the application of some deleterious gas, 

 that is heavier than atmospheric air; so that, after all, the clearing out of 

 the house, though it may seem troublesome at first, is perhaps the shortest 

 method of proceeding. 



In the council-room we observed a very good apparatus for pressing 

 specimens, which may serve, at the same time, as a seat, and is therefore, 

 we think, a very fitting article of furniture for a gardener's lodge. Fig. 117. 



118 



e 



--i^ 



e 







d 



c 













\0 ^V-V^-J-i-?"^ c,' ^c '-]h 





■ '" '"■■•^•'■«t>»m'"«U'«ummnMi. 



a. ■• 



is a perspective view of this press, reversed, the part intended for sitting 

 on being placed on the ground, in order to admit of putting in or taking 

 out the specimens. F'lg. 118. is a cross section, in which a is the board, 

 which in the present position forms the bottom, and when the press is 

 used as a seat, forms the top ; 6 is a cushion, of any soft material, such as 

 numerous folds of flannel, of uniform thickness, between which and the bot- 

 tom board are placed the specimens to be pressed, in sheets of coarse brown, 

 whitybrown, or blotting paper, according to circumstances ; c is the board 

 placed above the cushion to receive the pressure of the blocks (c?) and wedges 

 (e) ; /is a bar, firmly mortised into two end pieces (gg in/g. 1 17.), to con- 

 fine the wedges. The same letters are applied to the same parts in both figures; 

 from the first of which, indeed, without further description, any carpenter 

 will understand how to construct such a press. The length and breadth 

 should be such as to contain a sheet of paper of the largest size ; and the 

 depth should be that fitted for a stool, say about 

 18 in. The specimens, when gathered, are put 

 between sheets of dry paper, pressed for a few 

 hours, and then the sheets are taken out, and 

 laid singly on a dry floor or on a table, or in the 

 open air in the sun, and, after an hour or two's ex- 

 posure, put in again ; this practice being found to 

 give them a certain degree of toughness. When 

 specimens are to be attached by gum, toughness 

 is less an object, and they may therefore be dried 

 off at once between sheets of paper made very 

 hot ; by heating them in an oven, or before the 

 fire, taking the papers once or twice out of the 

 press, during the process of drying, and reheating 

 them. We also observed a species of hoe, sent 

 from Jersey ( fig. 119.), which seemed to us better 

 calculated for scraping the moss off' trees thau 

 for hoeing soils. 



