39 



PART 11. 



REVIEWS. 



Art. I. Insect Architecture : forming Vol. III. of the Library of 

 Entertaining Knowledge, 12mo. London, 1829. 



The high price of books is a subject on which, whatever 

 might have been the case formerly, there is no reasonable 

 ground for complaint in the present day. V^e do not mean 

 that there is not as great a number of costly and splendid 

 works published now as ever, but that there is also a propor- 

 tionate number of cheap ones. This is readily to be accounted 

 for by the more general diffusion of education; an increasing 

 taste for reading and thirst for acquiring knowledge having 

 called forth the exertions of a corresponding class of editors 

 and authors to meet the public demand. Accordingly there 

 have of late been so many new editions of sterling books, as 

 well as entirely new works published at a low or very mode- 

 rate price, that any one may now, for a comparatively small 

 sum of mor^ey, procure a tolerable library, sufficient for most 

 practical purposes ; provided only he be willing to forego the 

 enjoyment of such luxuries as portly quartos, coloured plates, 

 hot-pressed paper, and meadows of margin: We have lately 

 purchased a ti^at little pocket edition of White's Natural His- 

 tory ' of Sdborhe, enriched too with additional notes by Sir 

 William Jardine, for 3s* 6d.; and the book uoWm before us, 

 Insect Archttekure, consisting of more than 400 closely printed 

 duodecimo pages, and adorned with 160 illustrative wood- 

 cuts, is offered to the public at the very low cost of 45, . ' 



In 'a former Number of our Magazine (Vol. III. p. 80.), 

 when speaking of Xhfd^ Library of Ent&taining Knowledge (of 

 which Insect Architecture forms one volume), we briefly alluded 

 to this " singularly interesting and entertaining " work, and 

 then promised, when the second part appeared, to review the 

 whole more at length. This pledge we would now redeem. 

 It is not, however, our intention to enter upon a complete and 

 regular analysis of the work ; a plan which would involve us 

 Ih the necessity either of doing little more than transcribing 

 the table of contents, or of transferring to our -own pages too 

 considerable a portion of the volume before us. We shall 



D 4 



