PUBLISHED BY A. AND C. BLACK, LTD., 4, 5 AND 6, SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W. 1 AGENTS   PLATE 1. 1. Swallow Tail 2. Black-veined White 3. Large Garden White (Female) 4. Small Garden White (Male) 5. Green-veined White (Female) 6. Bath White (Male) 7. Orange Tip 8. Wood White (Male) 9. Pale Clouded Yellow First published May, 1912...

I take it that this little “Peep at Nature,” needs no apology; the exquisite coloured plates, produced direct from natural butterflies by the three-colour process, are a sufficient justification of its appearance. The author is a practical entomologist of many years’ standing. He writes from the fulness of a rich experience in the fields. He justly advocates the “Paisley” method of setting insects. I know it to be the more expeditious, and less calculated to damage specimens, than the ordinary p

What is the difference between a butterfly and a moth, and how am I to distinguish between them? is a question very often put to the student of insect life—the entomologist. Butterflies and moths both belong to the Natural Order, Lepidoptera , or scale-winged insects. Butterflies may be distinguished as day flyers, and the moths fly by night. The main physical difference between them appears in the forms of the antennæ, or horns; in the butterflies these organs are club-shaped at the extreme end

In the rearing of butterflies from eggs and in watching them all through their larval stages, we learn a great deal concerning their life and habits, and finally secure perfect specimens for the cabinet. But the glories of the chase and the charm of the country ramble weigh more in the balance with the naturalist, and the story of a captured specimen is often far more interesting than the record of a bred one. Of butterfly nets used in the chase there are many and varied patterns in the market.

The Swallow-Tail ( Papilio Machaon ), Plate I. , Fig. 1.—I find, in Scotland, where I live, that the first question put by friends looking over one’s insect treasures usually refers to this butterfly. “Is that a British butterfly?” they ask; and on being assured that it is, they tender the information that they never saw one like it in this neighbourhood; and it takes much explanation to make them understand how rare and local some butterflies and moths are. Alas! he is our one and only Swallow-