141 



rows of whitish spots extending- across both wings," and the " obscure crescent- 

 shaped spot of a deeper green than the rest on the disk of each," are not distinctly 

 expressed : and the naturally bright and gay colouring of the Gooseberry Moth, 

 Abraxas grossulariata, Fig. 1, Plate xxviii., has been, by no means, successfully 

 imitated. Yet these defects, of which we are surprized to find so small a number, 

 and for the removal of which a little attention in the getting-up of the future edi- 

 tions will suffice, are amply atoned for by the general excellence and beauty of 

 the volume. It is, in fine, a work with which every student of the British Lepi- 

 doptera should be conversant ; and to which even the veteran Entomologist 

 may refer with pleasure and advantage. 



The volume is headed by a very nicely engraved Portrait, and a Biographical 

 Memoir, of Maria Sibilla Merian, the celebrated authoress of divers interesting 

 works on Natural History ; of which the most important are the Metamorphosis 

 Tnsectorum Surinamensium, Folio ; and Erucarum Ortus, Alimentum et Para- 

 doxa Metamorphosis, etc., Quarto. She was born at Frankfort, 1647 ; and closed 

 a life of ardent and unwearied devotion to the cause of natural science, at the age 

 of 70. The countenance of this distinguished lady, as represented in an Engrav- 

 ing prefixed to her work on Caterpillars, strikingly confirms an observation which 

 we have frequently made, that Nature loves to conceal her brightest gems in a 

 disfigured or unsightly casket. By the magic touches of the British artist, how- 

 ever, the unprepossessing visage of Madame Merian has been transformed into a 

 somewhat fair and goodly face. Would to Heaven that the moral delinquencies, 

 which too frequently form the characteristic and the curse of genius, were thus 

 easy of reparation as its personal deformities and defects ! The hand and arm of 

 the Lady, however, as delineated in the English portrait, are coarsely and clum- 

 sily fashioned ; and could never, we confidently assert, have been associated with 

 a head of such fair dimensions, and a brain of such untiring energy, as Madame 

 Merian evidently possessed. 



German Periodicals. 



We have received the first three Numbers of a Journal, in Quarto, entitled 

 Isis. Encyclopadische Zeitschrift, vorzilglich fur Naturgeschichte, Vorglei- 

 chende Anatomie und Physiologie (The Isis, an Encyclopedian Journal of Na- 

 tural History, Comparative Anatomy and Physiology) for the year 1836. The 

 First and Second Numbers contain, each with three illustrative Engravings, a 

 very long and important paper on Physiology, the matter of which it is impossible 

 to condense within any reasonable limits. The Third is principally occupied by a 

 Report of the Meeting of Naturalists at Stuttgard on the 18th of September, 1834. 

 It is equally insusceptible of analysis or condensation. 



The Archiv fur Naturgeschichte, of which the first three monthly Numbers 



