330 DIRECTIONS FOR IHE MICROSCOPE. 



arc universally admired, and esteemed their peculiar ornament; but 

 place a butterfly's wing under a microscope, that avenue to unseen 

 glories in new worlds, and you will discover that nature has endowed 

 the most numerous of the insect tribes with the same privilege, mul- 

 tiplving in them the fomis, and diversifying the colouring of this kind 

 of clothing beyond all pandlel. The rich and velvet tints of the plu- 

 noage of buds'are not superior to what the curious observer may disco- 

 vermin a variety of Lcpidoptcra ; and those many-coloured eyes which 

 deck so gloriously the peacock's tail. are imiuited with success by one 

 of our most common buitcrflies. Feathers are tliought to be peculiar 

 to birds; but insects often imitate them in their antenna?, wings, and 

 even sometimes in the covering of their bodies.— We admire with 

 reason the coats of quadrupeds, whether their skins be covered with 

 pile, or wool, or fur; yet are not perhaps aware that a vast variety ot 

 insects are clothed with all these kinds of hair, but infinitely liner and 

 more silky in texture, more brilliant and delicate in colour, and more 

 variously shaded than what any other animals can jiretend to. 



" In variegation insects certainly exceed every other class of animated 

 beings. Nature, in her sportive muod, when painting them, sometimes 

 imitates the clouds of heaven; at others, the meandring course of the 

 rivers of the earth, or the undulations of their waters : many are 

 veined like beautiful marbles; others have the semblance of a robe of 

 the finest net-work thrown over them : some she blazons with heral- 

 dic insignia, giving them to bear infields sable — azure — vert — gules — 

 argent and or, fesses — bars — bends — crosses — crescents — stars, and 

 even animals. On many, taking her rule and compasses, she draws 

 with precision mathematical figures : i.oints, lines, angles, triangles, 

 squares, and circles. On others she pourtrays, with mystic hand, what 

 seem like hieroglyphic symbols, or inscribes them with the characters 

 and letters of various languages, often very correctly formed ; and 

 what is more extraordinary, she has registered in others figures which 

 correspond with several dates of the Christian era. 



•" Nor has nature been lavish only in the ap)iarel and ornament of 

 these privileged tribes; in other respects she has been equally un- 

 sparing of her fiivours. To some she has given fins like those offish,, 

 or a beak reseml'ling that of birds; to others horns, nearly the couri- 

 tcrparts of those of various quadrupeds. The bull, the stag, the rhi- 

 noceros, and even the hitherto vainly sought for unicorn, have in this 

 respect many representatives amongst insects. One is armed with 

 tusks not unlike those of the elephant; another is bristled with spines, 

 as the porcupine and hedge-hog with quills; a third is an armadillo in 

 miniature; the disproportioned hind legs of the kangaroo give a most 

 grotesque apjiearance to a fourth ; and the threatening head of the 

 s-nake is found in a fifth. It woidd, however, be endless to prochice all 



