THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 163 



the external features of insects. The great bulk of what passes for com- 

 parative anatomy, physiology and embryology, is purely descriptive, and 

 is only to be awarded a higher grade in a scale of studies than that which 

 deals with the external properties, when it requires a better training of the 

 hand and eye to carry it out, and greater patience of investigation. We 

 pass at once to a higher grade of research when we deal with comparisons 

 or processes (which, of course, involve comparisons). All good descrip- 

 tive work, indeed, is also comparative ; but at the best it is so only in the 

 narrowest sense, for only intimately allied forms are compared. In des- 

 criptive work we deal with simple facts ; in comparative work we deal with 

 their collocation. " Facts," said Agassiz, one day, " Facts are stupid 

 things, until brought in connection with some general law." 



It is to this higher plane that concerns itself with general laws that I 

 would urge the young student to bend his steps. The way is hard ; but 

 in this lies one of its charms, for labor is its own reward. It is by patient 

 plodding that the goal is reached ; every step costs and counts ; the ever- 

 broadening field of knowledge exhilarates the spirit and intensifies the 

 ambition ; there is no such thing as satiety — study of this sort never 

 palls. 



It is hardly necessary to point out that so-called systematic work never 

 reaches this higher grade unless it is monographic ; unless it deals in a 

 broad way with the relationship and general affinities of insects. It is not 

 my purpose to call attention here to the needs of science in this depart- 

 ment, as they are too patent to escape observation ; but if one desires a 

 model upon which to construct such work, one need not look further than 

 the Revision of the Rhynchophora by Drs. LeConte and Horn. Rather 

 than linger here, we prefer to pass directly to some of the obscurer fields 

 of study. 



When we compare the number of insect embryologists in America with 

 that of their European colleagues, the result is somewhat disheartening 

 and discreditable ; although perhaps the comparison would be not quite 

 so disproportionate were some of our students to publish their notes. But 

 take all that has been done upon both sides of the water, and what a 

 meager showing it makes. Of how many families of Coleoptera alone 

 have we the embryonic history of a single species ? Of two of the four 

 families of Butterflies, the fertile eggs of which are perfectly easy to obtain, 

 nothing is known. In short, one may readily choose numbers of typical 

 groups whose embryonic history would be a great acquisition to science. 



