5564 Natural- History Collectors. 



zilian accommodation ; and several days might profitably be spent 

 here in making excursions in different directions into the country on 

 either side of the river. 



Although every locality seems — as is to be expected — to have its 

 peculiar character of insects, yet generally, through our entire excur- 

 sion during this, the rainy season, we have found some orders every- 

 where abundant — some strangely scarce. Diurnal Lepidoptera abound, 

 and are indescribably beautiful : it has been hard indeed to devote 

 one's exclusive attention to any other group, when these exquisite 

 insects are flitting around in the not more brilliant sunshine. I 

 hardly know how far the Papilionidae of the Organ Mountains have 

 already received attention, but I am sure that if some of our English 

 Lepidopterists could have seen them, in sunshine, in shade, — in 

 masses of tens and twenties by the margins of forest streams, — they 

 could not have been satisfied with simple admiration : words are 

 wanting to convey any impression of their fresh beauty. Moths, 

 especially minute species, are common by beating, and during the 

 short twilight of evening : a little experience that we have had of 

 sugaring by night proved that it was as effectual here as in England. 

 Hemiptera are by no means abundant; Diptera appear to be almost 

 confined to those abominations, sand-flies, musquitos and " Borra- 

 chudos," a very insignificant looking atom, which swarms at Tijuca 

 and elsewhere, but which, by its bite, raises painful inflammations on 

 the face and backs of hands. Hymenoptera are decidedly rare: of 

 bees, although we have been at pains to capture all that we have met 

 with, 1 do not believe that a dozen species can be found in our 

 united collections: this is perhaps to be attributed to the unprece- 

 dented amount of rain that has lately fallen. The ants are very 

 numerous and most interesting: some species construct covered 

 galleries among the branches of trees ; others buwow 9 for miles, six 

 or ten feet below the surface of the ground ; some are carnivorous, 

 and seem to live principally on insects; others are vegetarians; one 

 species in this neighbourhood is welcomed as a friend to the house- 

 keeper, for when it marches through a house not a single cockroach or 

 spider is left behind it alive ; at Constancia and other localities there 

 is a species which, in a single night, will strip a large tree of every 

 leaf. In the forests on the Corcovardo range, we heard of — but could 

 not see — an ant which constructs its nest above ground five or eight 

 feet high; the sides of these nests are constructed of clay, worked up 

 by mastication, so that, after a few years, they obtain the consistency 

 of porous stone : in this state they have a commercial value; they are 



