292 NATURAL HISTORY. [cH. XXII. 



majority of winged insects being smaller than the 

 full-grown larvae from whence they have sprung. 



To this state succeeds, in some of the orders, a 

 state of inactivity, somewhat similar to that of the 

 chrysalis of butterflies ; but in the other orders the 

 insect continues to feed and move throughout this 

 period, for which, whether active or quiescent, we 

 possess no other term than nymph to distinguish it 

 from the chrysalis state of the butterfly. Some 

 peculiarity is, however, observable in the nature of 

 the transformations of each order, which we will 

 now proceed shortly to notice. 



In the first place, however, we will observe, that 

 although in the introduction to our former volume 

 we have divided the metamorphoses of insects into 

 two kinds — partial, in which the insect does not 

 vary in its form, so that it may be recognised in all 

 its states as the same individual — and complete, in 

 which the pupae take no food, and are incapable of 

 motion, and the change is such that nothing but the 

 evidence of our senses would convince us of the 

 identity of the insect in its first and last states — 

 this mode of distribution requires some modifica- 

 tion, since the pupae of the dragonfly, as may be 

 perceived from the figures in our first volume, are 

 active and voracious, although their broad form 

 would scarcely be supposed likely to produce so 

 elegant and slender-shaped an insect as the Libel- 

 lulcB. Moreover, the gnat is very active during the 

 pupa state, although its larva is of a totally different 

 form; and in the caddice-flies the pupae become ac- 

 tive towards the period of their disclosure as perfect 

 insects. 



The first peculiarity noticeable in the transforma- 

 tions of insects is that exhibited by spiders, scor- 

 pions, mites, harvest-men, &c., composing the class 

 ArachnidcE., and by centipedes, millepedes, lice, su- 

 gar-lice, &c., comprising the class Ametahola. In 

 these animals the only change which takes place 



