4G SYSTEMS OF ENTOMOLOGY. 



that the student should confine himself to that system, hut merely ro 

 introduce him to a knowledge of the Fumihcs, for in this term the 

 genera of Linne may certainly be applied in most cases, and which 

 every entomologist will readily admit. Mr. Spence has observed, in 

 his excellent Monograph of the Genus Choleva in the XJth vol. of the 

 Transactions ti/' the Linna-an Societi/ : " Jt is contrary both to analogy 

 and experience to supi)ose the Creator has formed fewer of those 

 groupes into which we divide the vast tribes of nature by the name of 

 genera in one department than in another. Now in Botany, in which 

 not more than about 20,000 species have been dcscribed,we have upwards 

 of 2000 genera. In Entomology at least as many species are already de- 

 scribed; and when we combine the circumstances, that in Britain not 

 fewer than 8000 species of insects are to be found, while we have about 

 iWOO plants ; and these are probably not one half of the European insects, 

 while we know that every other quarter of the globe is still more ])ro- 

 lific in species wholly dift'erent; and lastly, that every kind of plant 

 probably affords nutriment on the average to three or four species of 

 insects, there can he little doubt that the insect is vastly more popu- 

 lous than the vegetable world. Is it likely then that the number of 

 genera should be much fewer than in botany; or at any rate that it 

 should not very greatly exceed its present amoimt.? Wc need not 

 fear that the science will be rendered more difilcult by an augmen- 

 tation of its genera. This cannot happen, if a proper system be adopt- 

 etl. If two or three insects, or even a single one, be strikingly charac- 

 terized by peculiarity of habit, they certainly ought in any .system to 

 be distinguished at least as sections of the genera under which they are 

 placed. And will it increase the difficulty of iiivestigatinn if they be 

 established as genera upon the same cliaractcrs, and distinguished by a 

 name } Clearly not. On the contrary, the science can be efiectually 

 promoted in no other way; for names liave an important influence 

 upon the clearness of our ideas, and it will be impossible for us ever 

 to gain correct views of the philosophy of our science while genera es- 

 sentially distinct are jumbled together imder one title. 



" Entomology, therefore, is under the greatest obligations to Illiger 

 in Germany, Latreille in France," (Kirby, Leach, and Spence in En- 

 gland) ; " who having had the good sense to reject the useless while they 

 retain the valuable parts of the Fabrician system, are labouring, by the 

 institution of new genera built upon firm and intelligible characters, to 

 extricate the science from the chaos into which that author has un- 

 wittingly reduced it. F'abricius's system has now had a fair trial of 

 upwards of thirty years, and it was at one time universally followed ou 

 the continent; yet so far is experience from having confirmed the as- 

 sertion of its author, that the Linnaean .system is only calculated to 

 introduce confusion into the science, that the very system professing 

 to dissipate that confusion is even now fast sinking into oblivion, while 



