Butterflies and moths.

Then follow three tables (5-7) of splendid butterflies, with their brilliant tints.  The two tables (8, 9) ranged next in order to those upon which the butterflies are distributed, are covered with varieties of the moth.  Here are the silkworm moth and its cocoon as kept in Siberia; the ghost moth of our hop grounds; the hawk moth, the death’s head moth, and the large Brazilian owl moth.

The next table (10) is covered with a great variety of flies and bugs, including the Chinese lantern flies.

The eleventh table is given up to Spiders in all their varieties, including the tarantula, a formidable insect with a power of severe biting; and the curious spider that bores a nest in the ground, lines it sumptuously with its own silk, and then constructs a lid that closes inevitably, as the insect leaves its house.  Here too are the scorpions.  The last table of the series (12) is covered also with varieties of the spider, including the land and shepherd spiders; the African scarlet tick, and the centipedes.  The visitor has now completed his survey of the contents of this room, and should at once pass forward in an easterly direction, traverse the British zoological room, which he has already examined throughout, and pass into the fourth room of the gallery.

The table-cases in this room present nothing that can greatly interest the unscientific visitor.  They are covered with varieties of

STARFISH; SEA-EGGS, ETC.

The sea-eggs are scattered over the first nine tables (1-9) in the room.  They live on small animals and sea-weed.  The varieties include a flat kind, vulgarly called sea-pancakes.  The remaining cases of the room are loaded with varieties of the star-fish.  The mouth of the star-fish is on its lower side, through which it takes its food.  It has innumerable feet, which it displays when in the water, and by means of which it can climb rocks.  Some of the varieties fall to pieces on being taken from their native element, as the lizard, or brittle star-fish.  The gorgon’s head, which has innumerable branches from its central part, should be observed by the visitor; and the sea-wigs, which are a kind of star-fish, somewhat resembling the gorgon’s head, with innumerable radii.  They are placed upon table 24, near a cast of a stem and flower, that has the appearance of a fossil plant, but is in reality a cast of a crinoid star-fish that once existed in great abundance.  In the most eastern room of this gallery are a few tables upon which are deposited the shells and tubes of molluscous animals, to illustrate their changes, and the way in which the animal adapts them to his position.  The third and fourth tables will, perhaps, interest the general visitor.  Here he will find specimens exhibiting the growth of Shells, and also how the animal repairs any damage to its shell.  Here, too, are the shells upon which the modern cameo-cutters of Rome, work.  As the visitor will perceive, the design is engraved in relief upon the light outer layers of the shell, leaving the darker under part exposed, as a back-ground.