172 Analysis of Scientific Books ayid Memoirs. 



larger, than the boasted pyramids of Egypt, when the size of the animal is 

 taken into consideration. And when to all this is added the wonderful 

 mechanism of their minute organs, — the evidences of design in their still 

 more wonderful transformations and their instincts, — one is not surprised 

 at the assertion of the first entomologist of Europe, (M. Latreille), that the 

 wonders of insect structure — the concentration of organs so minute and 

 susce]>tible of so many different sensations in such an atom of matter, 

 heightened his admiration of the Supreme Intelligence far beyond what the 

 contemplation of the structure or the most gigantic animals could inspire^ 



The History of Insects in the Family Library, from its popular 

 form, is calculated to spread a taste for the study of entomology among 

 readers to whom the details of the more scientific naturalists might at first 

 possess no attraction. A similar work on Insect Architecture, in the Li' 

 brary of Entertaining Knowledge, will aid the volume before us in spread- 

 ing a taste for scientific information still wider ; and we hail with pleasure 

 the exertions of those learned men who, by works such as the present, 

 show how much may be done for science by simplifying its details so as to 

 extend its range. The Institutions for the instruction of workmen and their 

 success, has demonstrated that a vast portion of physical science, hitherto 

 shut up in volumes destined for the learned, may be placed within the reach 

 of ordinary readers, and much that is generally useful in connection with 

 the arts of life, successfully taught even to the unlettered mechanic. The 

 Library of Useful Knowledge led the way in this country in placing 

 science within the reach of the poor ; and the numerous Manuels, Re- 

 sumes, and Precis of all the sciences and arts which teem from the press 

 m France in a compressed form and low price, show that an extensive, 

 and, we hope, a happy change has taken place in regard to the desire of 

 scientific instruction. The writers of most of these popular treatises too, 

 in both countries, are men of known talent, versant in the subjects upon 

 which they write ; and, while instruction is conveyed to the mass of the 

 community in a simple and intelligible form, the more learned are satisfied 

 that the materials are the result both of extensive reading and observa- 

 tion. 



Among the sciences thus thrown open to all classes, Natural History has 

 long appeared to us as that branch which, beyond every other, is calculat- 

 ed not only to captivate the young of both sexes, and to improve their 

 powers of observation and reasoning in a high degree, but to open the way 

 for the successful pursuit of the other sciences. All the materials of com- 

 merce and the arts are derived from objects with which it is the business 

 of natural history to make us acquainted ; all the conveniences and neces- 

 sities of man are supplied from the same source ; and the moral tendency 

 of such studies is so palpably evident, as to make it matter of surprise that 

 a general knowledge of external nature has not ere now formed part of the 

 elementary instruction in schools for the young. 



But to return to the history of Insects in the volume now before us. No 

 systematic plan seems to be adopted in the arrangement of the orders, which 

 may have appeared superfluous in a book intended for general readers. The 

 ▼olume commences with the history of that useful insect the Hive Bee, in 



