WRITINGS ON INSECT ANATOMY. 7 



the morphology and physiology of 1828 have become as obsolete 

 as the Ptolemaic astronomy, the naturalist will study these 

 exquisite delineations of Insect-structure with something of the 

 pleasure to be found in examining for the hundredth time a 

 delicate organism familiar to many generations of microscopic 

 observers. 



The fidelity and love of anatomical detail which characterise 

 the description of the Cockchafer are not less conspicuous in 

 Straus-Diirckheim's Anatomic Descriptive du Chat (1846). Both 

 treatises have become classical. 



We have seen how, in Straus-Durckheim's hands, Insect 

 anatomy became comparative. New studies histology, embry- 

 onic development, and palaeontology have since arisen to com- 

 plicate the task of the descriptive anatomist, and it appears to 

 be no longer possible for one man to complete the history 

 of any animal of elaborate structure and ancient pedigree. 

 As a method of research the monograph has had its day. The 

 path of biological discovery now follows an organ or a function 

 across all zoological boundaries, and it is in the humbler 

 office of biological teaching that the monograph finds its proper 

 use. 



Later Insect Anatomists. 



It is impossible even to glance at the many anatomists who 

 have illustrated the structure of Insects by studies, less simple 

 in plan, but not less profitable to science, than those of the 

 monographers. If we attempt to select two or three names for 

 express mention, it is with a conviction that others are left 

 whom the student is bound to hold in equal honour. 



Dufour* laboured, not unsuccessfully, to construct a General 

 Anatomy of Insects, which should combine into one view a 



tf 



crowxl of particular facts. The modern reader will gratefully 

 acknowledge his industry and the beauty of his drawings, but 

 will now and then complain that his sagacity does not do 

 justice to his diligence. 



* Dufour. Eech. anat. et phys. sur les Hemipteres (1833) les Orthopteres, les 

 Hymenopteres et les Neuropteres (1841), et les Dipteres (1851). Mem. de 1'Institut, 

 Tom. IV., VII., XI. Also many memoirs in Ann. des Sci. Nat. 



