PREFACE. 



In preparing the following pages, as an introduction to the science 

 of Entomology, the primary object has been to supply a need of the 

 farmer and horticulturist. For while the ravages of noxious insects 

 have an indirect effect upon the prosperity and convenience of every 

 one, it is to the agriculturist more directly that their absence or preva- 

 lence brings financial success or failure. It is true that there are 

 already almost innumerable publications, many of them of great value, 

 on the subject of economic entomology, as wellas those of more strictly 

 scientific importance, all of which are accessible to any inquirer ; but 

 it is undeniable that a lack of some general knowledge of the life 

 histories of insects, and an unfamiliarity with many of the terms used 

 in description, deprive those for whom they are prepared of a large 

 share of the benefit they might derive from them. 



I do not ignore the fact that this want has been realized by many of 

 our most distinguished entomologists, and that several text-books have 

 been prepared to meet it; but the objective to these is, that the authors 

 have gone into the subject too thoroughly, have dwelt upon points of 

 structure that the business man has neither time nor skill to trace out, 

 have discussed phenomena that are chiefly interesting to the philoso- 

 pher, and which make the study seem too abstruse. 



The following pages are an attempt at something more elementary, 

 remembering that there are those who have yet to learn the difference 

 between a beetle and a bug, or between a moth and a butterfly ; to whom 

 the transformations of insects offer a puzzle which they cannot solve, 

 and who are completely daunted and discouraged by a half-dozen suc- 

 cessive technical terms. This little introduction aims to help the be- 

 ginner over some of the first difiSculties he is liable to encumber in 

 taking up the subject systematically, and the author hopes it will be 

 the means of attracting him to the study of the more exact and com- 

 prehensive treatises of Dr. Packard, Prof. Comstock and others. 



Incomplete and simple as this work is, it is hoped, however, that 

 the definitions are suflSciently explicit to enable the student to place all 



