26 IVORTH AIVIERICAN INSECTS. 



It may seem a long digression, but the lovely insects of 

 that place, as they appear in my cabinet, or are pictured 

 forth on canvas for the inspection of my readers, excite in 

 me a thousand grateful emotions, that "come crowding 

 thickly up for utterance." It is worth a visit to the Pen- 

 insula of the Crimea to behold these beautiful insects ; it 

 ten times repays one to make the acquaintance of its lovely 

 inhabitants. The climate there is an eternal spring. The 

 undulating soil .is rich in all kinds of delicious fruits and 

 vegetables — the scenery highly romantic, consisting of an- 

 cient castles in ruins, at the foot of which are seen domestic 

 camels, and on the open fields before them herds of four- 

 horned sheep. Here is 



" The land of the cedar and vine, 

 Where the flowers CA^er blossom, the beams ever shine ; 

 Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit. 

 And the voice of the nightingale never is mute ; 

 Where the tints of the earth and the hues of the sky, 

 In color though varied, in beauty may vie. 

 And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye ; 

 Where the virgins are soft as the roses they twine, 

 And the spirit of man is all but divine !" 



Although this ten'estrial paradise now belongs to Russia, 

 and its inhabitants have lost their national independence, 

 still they have preserved their genuine Caucasian beauty ; 

 and while gazing with admiration upon them, it has often 

 occurred to me that the Apollo of Belvedere, the Venus de 

 Medicis, and the Madonna of Raphael must have been ac- 

 curate copies of the men and women of the Crimea. 



Their morals are not less to be admired than their beau- 

 ty. Drunkenness, quarreling, riots, and murders are en- 

 tirely unknown there. You may travel unarmed and laden 

 with riches, from one end of the country to the other, with- 

 out beinof molested ; such a thing as a thief is never heard 

 of there ; and every where, in the cottage and in the palace, 



