Page:Scouting for girls, adapted from Girl guiding.djvu/121

Rh creatures over field and swamp, and hedge and ditch. If possible, try not to spoil the wings, and then keep them alive in a cage or a greenhouse. You can keep the eggs they lay, and bring up a large family for next year. You can make your own net if you buy a yard of stout wire, and bend it round, and bind the ends tightly and neatly to a cane or stick.

Make your net long enough to hang across the wire, when your butterfly is caught, thus:—



Examine the wings carefully with a magnifying glass, as the tiny scarlet and yellow feathers are easily rubbed off and spoilt, especially if the creature flutter about.

Personally I don't use a net; I catch them by drawing their portraits in my sketch-book. It saves a lot of trouble to them and to me.

Trees.—Then Scouts should know all about the different trees in their country and know their names by their appearance in summer and also in winter; and what they are good for, and what their leaves are like and their flower or their fruit as the case may be. It helps you very much in camp to know what kind of wood burns well, such as pine wood or sugar bush or gum tree. Also which kinds of wood are best for carving, for making walking sticks, for painting on.