that the more exalted the object the more excellent the study. By this observation, however, I would by no means be thought to depreciate or discountenance the study either of plants or minerals. All the works of our Creator are great, and worthy of our attention and investigation, the lowest in the scale as well as the highest, the most minute and feeble, as well as those that exceed in magnitude and might. Nor ought those whose inclination or genius leads them to one department, to say to those who prefer another-"we have no need of you"for each in his place, by diffusing the knowledge of his works and adding to the stock of previous discoveries, contributes to promote the glory of the Great Architect of the universe and the good of his creatures.

It is not my wish to claim for my favourite science more than of right belongs to her; therefore, when the question is concerning rank, I must concede to the higher orders of animals, I mean Fishes, Amphibia, Birds, and Quadrupeds, their due priority and precedence. I shall only observe here, that there may exist circumstances which countervail rank, and tend to render the study of a lower order of beings more desirable than that of a higher: when, for instance, the objects of the higher study are not to be come at or preserved without great difficulty and expense; when they are few in number; or, when they are already well ascertained and known: circumstances which attach to the study of those animals that precede insects, while they do not attach to the study of insects themselves.

With regard to the amusement and instruction of the student, much doubtless may be derived from any one of the sciences alluded to: but Entomology certainly is not

behind any of her sisters in these respects; and if you are fond of novelty, and anxious to make new discoveries, she will open to you a more ample field for these than either Botany or the higher branches of Zoology.

A new animal or plant is seldom to be met with even by those who have leisure and opportunity for extensive researches; but if you collect insects, you will find, however limited the manor upon which you can pursue your game, that your efforts are often rewarded by the capture of some non-descript or rarity at present not possessed by other entomologists, for I have seldom seen a cabinet so meager as not to possess some unique specimen. Nay, though you may have searched every spot in your neighbourhood this year, turned over every stone, shaken every bush or tree, and fished every pool, you will not have exhausted its insect productions. Do the same another and another, and new treasures will still continue to enrich your cabinet. If you leave your own vicinity for an entomological excursion, your prospects of success are still further increased; and even if confined in bad weather to your inn, the windows of your apartment, as I have often experienced, will add to your stock. If a sudden shower obliges you at any time to seek shelter under a tree, your attention will be attracted, and the tedium of your station relieved, where the botanist could not hope to find even a new lichen or moss, by the appearance of several insects, driven there perhaps by the same cause as yourself, that you have not observed before. Should you, as I trust you will, feel a desire to attend to the manners and economy of insects, and become ambitious of making discoveries in this part of entomological science, I can assure you, from long experi

ence, that you will here find an inexhaustible fund of novelty. For more than twenty years my attention has been directed to them, and during most of my summer walks my eyes have been employed in observing their ways; yet I can say with truth, that so far from having exhausted the subject, within the last six months I have witnessed more interesting facts respecting their history than in many preceding years. To follow only the insects that frequent your own garden, from their first to their last state, and to trace all their proceedings, would supply an interesting amusement for the remainder of your life, and at its close you would leave much to be done by your successor; for where we know thoroughly the history of one insect, there are hundreds concerning which we have ascertained little besides the bare fact of their existence.

But numerous other sources of pleasure and information will open themselves to you, not inferior to what any other science can furnish, when you enter more deeply into the study. Insects, indeed, appear to have been nature's favourite productions, in which, to manifest her power and skill, she has combined and concentrated almost all that is either beautiful and graceful, interesting and alluring, or curious and singular, in every other class and order of her children. To these, her valued miniatures, she has given the most delicate touch and highest finish of her pencil. Numbers she has armed with glittering mail, which reflects a lustre like that of burnished metals; in others she lights up the dazzling radiance of polished gems. Some she has decked with what looks

a

The genera Eumolpus, F. Lamprima, Latr. Rynchites, Herbst.
Cryptorhynchus rutilans, Kirby.

like liquid drops, or plates of gold and silver 2; or with scales or pile, which mimic the colour and emit the ray of the same precious metals. Some exhibit a rude exterior, like stones in their native state, while others represent their smooth and shining face after they have been submitted to the tool of the polisher: others, again, like so many pygmy Atlases bearing on their backs a microcosm, by the rugged and various elevations and depressions of their tuberculated crust, present to the eye of the beholder no unapt imitation of the unequal surface of the earth, now horrid with mis-shapen rocks, ridges, and precipices-now swelling into hills and mountains, and now sinking into valleys, glens, and caves; while not a few are covered with branching spines, which fancy may form into a forest of trees ".

What numbers vie with the charming offspring of Flora in various beauties! some in the delicacy and variety of their colours, colours not like those of flowers evanescent and fugitive, but fixed and durable, surviving their subject, and adorning it as much after death as they did when it was alive; others, again, in the veining and texture of their wings; and others in the rich cottony down that clothes them. To such perfection, indeed, has nature in them carried her mimetic art, that you would declare, upon beholding some insects, that they had robbed the trees of their leaves to form for themselves artificial wings, so exactly do they resemble them in their form,

* Hesperia Cupido, F. Papilio Passiflora, Lathonia, L. &c. b Pepsis fuscipennis, argentata, F. &c.

The species of the genus Trox, F.

Many of the Scarabaeida, Dynastida, MacLeay, &c.

Many caterpillars of Butterflies. Merian Surinam, t. xxii. xxv.

&c. and of Sawflies. Reaum. v. t. xii. ƒ. 7, 8—14.

substance, and vascular structure; some representing green leaves, and others those that are dry and withereda. Nay, sometimes this mimicry is so exquisite, that you would mistake the whole insect for a portion of the branching spray of a tree. No mean beauty in some plants arises from the fluting and punctuation of their stems and leaves, and a similar ornament conspicuously distinguishes numerous insects, which also imitate with multiform variety, as may particularly be seen in the caterpillars of many species of the butterfly tribe (Papilionida), the spines and prickles which are given as a Noli me tangere armour to several vegetable productions.

In fishes the lucid scales of varied hue that cover and defend them are universally admired, and esteemed their peculiar ornament; but place a butterfly's wing under a microscope, that avenue to unseen glories in new worlds, and you will discover that nature has endowed the most numerous of the insect tribes with the same privilege, multiplying in them the forms, and diversifying the colouring of this kind of clothing beyond all parallel. The rich and velvet tints of the plumage of birds are not superior to what the curious observer may discover in a variety of Lepidoptera; and those many-coloured eyes which deck so gloriously the peacock's tail are imitated with success by one of our most common butterflies ". Feathers are thought to be peculiar to birds; but insects often imitate them in their antennæ, wings, and even sometimes in the covering

■ Various species of the genera Locusta and Mantis, F. Many species of Phasma.

d Papilio Io, L.

e De Geer, I. t. 3. f. 1—34, &c.

Culex, L. Chironomus, Meig., and other Tipulida. 'Pterophorus, F.