INTRODUCTION. 



15 



We do not wish that children should be encouraged 

 to expose themselves to danger, in their encounters 

 with insects. They should be taught to avoid those 

 few which are really noxious — to admire all — to 

 injure none. 



The various beauty of insects — their glittering 

 colours, their graceful forms — supplies an inexhaus- 

 tible source of attraction. Even the most formidable 

 insects, both in appearance and reality, — the dragon- 

 fly, which is perfectly harmless to man, and the wasp, 

 whose sting every human being almost instinctly 

 shuns, — are splendid in their appearanbe, and are 

 painted with all the brilliancy of natural hues. It 

 has been remarked, that the plumage of trophical 

 birds is not superior in vivid colouring to what may 

 be observed in the greater number of butterflies and 

 moths.* " See !" exclaims Linnseus, " the large, 

 elegant painted wings of the butterfly, four in num- 

 ber, covered with delicate feathery scales ! With these 

 it sustains itself in the air a whole day, rivalling the 

 flight of birds and the brilliancy of the peacock. 

 Consider this insect through the wonderful progress 

 of its life, — how different is the first period of its 

 being fi-om the second, and both from the parent 

 insect ! Its changes are an inexplicable enigma to 

 us : we see a green caterpillar, furnished with sixteen 

 feet, feeding upon the leaves of a plant ; this is 

 changed into a chrysahs, smooth, of golden lustre, 

 hanging suspended to a fixed point, without feet, and 

 subsisting without food ; this insect again undergoes 

 another transformation, acquires wings, and six feet, 

 and becomes a gay butterfly, sporting in the air, and 

 living by suction upon the honey of plants. What 

 has Nature produced more worthy of our admiration 

 than such an animal coming upon the stage of the 



* Miss Jervym's Butterfly Collector, p. H- 



