8 INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 



that of burnished metals*; in others she lights up the 

 dazzling radiance of polished gems''. Some she has 

 decked with what looks like liquid drops, or plates of 

 gold and silver'; or with scales or pile, which mimic 

 the coloiu" and emit the ray of the same precious me- 

 tals ^. Some exhibit a rude exterior, like stones in their 

 native state*", while others represent their smooth and 

 shining face after they have been submitted to the tool 

 of the polisher : others, again, like so many pygmy At- 

 lases bearing on tlieir backs a microcosm, by the rug- 

 ged and various elevations and depressions of their tu- 

 berculated crust, present to the eye of the beholder no 

 unapt imitation of the unequal surface of the earth, now 

 horrid with mis-shapen rocks, ridges, and precipices — 

 now swelling into hills and mountains, and now sinking 

 into valleys, glens, and caves ^; while not a few are co- 

 vered with branching spines, which fancy may form 

 into a forest of trees s. 



What numbers vie with the charming offspring of 

 Flora in various beauties ! some in the delicacy and 

 variety of their colours, colours not like those of flowers 

 evanescent and fugitive, but fixed and durable, surviv- 

 ing their subject, and adorning it as much after death 

 as they did when it was alive ; others, again, in the 

 veining and texture of their wings ; and others in the 

 rich cottony down that clothes them. To such perfec- 

 tion, indeed, has nature in them carried her mimetic art, 



* The Genera Eumolpits, F. Lamprhna, Latr. Ryncfdtes, Herbst. 

 '' A non-desciipt Jiyncheenus, F. from Brazil. 



" Ilespcria Cupido, F. Papilio Passijlortv, Lathonia, L. &c. 



* Pepsisfuscipennis, argentata, F. &c. * The species of the genus Trox, F, 

 'Many of the ScarabeEidw. ^ Reaum. v. t. 12, f. 7,8—14, 



