150 ZOOLOGY. 
may be readily taken by making a pile of this material and looking through 
it in the course of a day or twe. Some species which live in moist places, 
or beneath the sand along the margins of water courses, can be driven from 
their retreats by dashing up water with the hand. Hosts of small species 
are found amongst the grass, from which they may be swept with a canvas 
net attached to a stout wire ring twelve or thirteen inches in diameter, and 
fixed in a handle about two feet long. The canvas and fixtures must be 
sufficiently strong to allow briers and other rough vegetation to be swept 
without injury toit. A great many species are attracted by a light at night. 
When captured, Coleoptera (and other insects which are not readily injured) 
should be put into small short vials in which a little paper has been put to 
ulow them to cling to, but predaceous ones should be put into a bottle with 
a little ether in it, as they would destroy the others. For the smaller kinds 
a bottle must be provided with a quill (to be closed with a stopper) inserted 
through the cork, through which they are to be passed into the bottle, to 
prevent the inmates from escaping when a new prisoner is to be added. 
These may be killed by having a little paper in the vial moistened with 
ether, or by immersing the hole in hot water. 
Each specimen should have a pin of a suitable size passed vertically 
through the right wing cover, to within less than half an inch of the head. 
When an insect is too small to have a pin passed through it, this must be 
stuck through the large end of a small triangle or wedge of thin card, about | 
one fourth of an inch long, and one sixteenth of an inch wide at the large 
end, the opposite end being pointed. Upon the upper surface of the point 
of this card, small insects must be gummed, and in such a position that the 
pin being vertical and upon the right, and the point of the card towards the 
left side, the insect must cross it at right angles, the right elytron being 
towards the pin, and the abdomen towards the manipulator, and this 
position must be preserved in the cabinet. The gum used must be gum 
arabic, with a little starch and inspissated ox gall, this being indispensable 
to prevent the gum from flying with the extremes of temperature, and it is 
sufficiently adhesive to prevent insects from being jarred loose by touching 
the pins. The same material is to be used in weplige insects. The pins 
used for the small cards should be small No. 1 of fe German manufac- 
turers, and in general thin pins should be preferred. When insect pins 
cannot be procured, the ordinary kinds may be used, but in this case a great 
many specimens must be attached to cards. If pins are subsequently pro- 
cured, the carded insects may be placed for a few hours in a closed vessel 
of moist sand, when they can be detached, and will be sufficiently relaxed 
to allow them to be pinned without breaking the antennee and feet. 
Specimens are to be arranged in horizontal rows on the drawers of a 
cabinet, made with every joint close. The drawers for the Coleoptera of 
the United States may be from twenty to twenty-four in number, of a size 
to allow a glazed cover to each, of ten by twelve inch glass, the frame of 
which should both enter about half an inch within, and project over the 
edge of the drawer on the four sides, to give double security to the joint. 
This frame should be carefully fitted before the drawer is put in. The 
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