38 THE KNTOMOLOGTST. 



against the sky. I have seen green nets and even black nets, but 

 give me a white one. 



Dragonflies are best set as soon as they are killed — say,.bv a 

 pinch on the thorax, or, better still, by the cyanide bottle. The 

 cyanide does not seem to produce rigor moj'tifi as in the case of 

 Lepidoptera. I use a flat setting-board. It gives the dragonflies 

 a smarter appearance ; but this is, perhaps, a matter of opinion. 

 If unset and dried they can be easily relaxed by being placed in 

 a well-corked pickle bottle half filled with cut and bruised laurel 

 leaves with a piece of perforated card on the top. By this 

 method there is no fear of " mould," and the same may be said 

 in relaxing Lepidoptera. Insects may be left, in splendid con- 

 dition for setting, as long as a fortnight, according to the time of 

 year. 



The great objection against most of the dragonflies is that 

 their colours fade. But their identity does not depend exclusively 

 on these fading colours. And, even in a faded dragonfly, the 

 markings reappear under a pocket microscope. At any ra,te a 

 collection of these insects is a beautiful and interesting sight, 

 and will well repay the exertions of, I venture to prophesy, many 

 a future collector. 



Chester, October 28th, 1892. 



DEIOPEIA PULCHELLA IN HAMPSHIEE. 

 By G. B. Corbin. 



For every recorded occurrence of this and other similarly 

 erratic species no doubt many specimens pass away without ever 

 coming under the eye of an entomologist. This uncertainty of 

 its occurrence in each year is amply verified by the table, Entom. 

 XXV. J54; for while in 1870 thirty specimens are recorded, the 

 five years from 1887 to 1891, inclusive, are without a single 

 record, and this surely not from want of observers, for we must 

 conclude they are ever increasing, if we take into consideration 

 that at present there are three or four journals devoted exclusively 

 to entomology, whilst within the memory of many of us, ' The 

 Weekly Entomologist,' ' The Entomologist 's Annual,' and other 

 publications of a like nature, died from sheer lack of support. 

 An unrecorded specimen of D. pulchella, from the neighbourhood 

 between Bingwood and Christchurch, came into my hands about 

 the end of June. It is bodiless, but I relaxed and " set " the 

 wings, which are in tolerable condition, considering the rough 

 handling it must have passed through, as it was taken some time 

 previously, and its incarceration in the tobacco-box of a labouring 

 man added nothing to its perfection. A second specimen of the 

 moth is said to have been seen at the same time and place, but I 



