PREPARING AND STUFFING ANIMALS. 
with two semicircular rims attached, and tested and secnred 
by a cord ; the bag being sprinkled over copiously with snuff, 
the trap being laid and baited, when the reptile approaches it 
the pincers are employed, and if they are adroitly used, the 
serpent is introduced into the bag, which instantly closes, and 
the serpent soon dies, for snuff is a deadly poison to it. 
Batrachians, or frogs and toads, are neither dangerous nor 
difficult to take. They are cold-blooded, slow, and heavy, and 
cannot escape by flight. They haunt dark and humid places, 
and the safest way to take them, so as to avoid injury to the 
skin, is to seize them with the hand, either naked or gloved. 
With the exception of the larger species, reptiles are not usually 
mounted. The vivid and brilliant colours of the majority of 
them are extremely beautiful, and are best preserved in spirits 
of wine. 
Fish are captured by many different processes : in soft 
water by line and bait of many kinds ; in the sea these means 
are insufficient, but give place to other processes, on which we 
need not enter here. Fish are sometimes stuffed, but generally 
are only divested of the intestines, and plunged into alcohol ; 
sometimes the dead skins are mounted on paper. 
Crustacea are preserved for a long time in salt water. After 
many years in this water their colours are only slightly altered. 
They may be transported to any distance in this preservation 
of colour. This process preserves the animal perfectly intact. 
Mollusks are procured with equal ease, but they are un- 
fitted for mounting. The animal discolours, and even gets 
as hard as horn, without some means of preserving it in its 
natural state. They are generally sought for their shells. 
Insects. — Among insects, butterflies and moths are the most 
attractive ; and in indicating the locality in which they are to 
be found, I might content myself with the well-known advice 
of an eminent entomologist, in reply to a similar question, 
“ Search everywhere.” I will, however, specify a few places 
where I have found some of the most beautiful of them. The 
white admiral, distinguished by the silvery blue and brown 
markings below, with bands and spots of pure white, is found 
in June and July, its favourite haunt being oak woods in 
Kent, Essex, and Sussex, and, I believe, also in the north of 
England. The purple emperor, so named from the splendid 
purple of its wings, is also a denizen of the woods, being found 
near Colchester in the Great and Little Stone Woods, in the 
Forest of Dean, in Darenth Wood, and other and similar locali- 
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