56 STUDY OF NATURAL HISTORY 
Of illustrated works belonging to this school, 
there are two of great merit. Fabricius found 
a powerful supporter in the celebrated French 
entomologist Olivier*, who, after travelling exten- 
sively in Turkey, Egypt, and Persia, returned, and 
eommenced his great work upon coleopterous in- 
sects; the richest in figures and in description we 
yet possess. Roemer}, also, has illustrated the 
genera of Fabricius with remarkably good figures, 
drawn with a boldness rarely seen in those of other 
artists. But the most splendid work of this descrip- 
tion relative to British insects, which appeared in 
this era, is the Aurelian of Moses Harrist{, the 
executor of Drury’s figures, already mentioned, 
and whose beautiful plates far exceed those of 
Albin, Wilks, or Donovan, on the same subject. 
Harris cannot be regarded as a scientific entomolo- 
gist, yet it is curious to trace the perception he had 
of natural arrangement. He was the first, in fact, 
who distributed all the British Diurnal Lepidoptera 
into those genera termed modern, long before those 
who have the credit of so doing were born. The 
excessive rarity of the little tract which substantiates 
this fact, so honourable to our countryman, is no 
doubt the reason why it has never been noticed§, a 
* Olivier. Entomologie, ou Histoire Naturelle des In- 
sectes. Paris, 1789—1808. 5 vols. 4to. 
+ J. J. Roemer. Genera Insectorum Linnzi et Fabricii 
Iconibus illustrata. Vit. Helv. 1789.  4to. 
+ Moses Harris. The Aurelian; or, Natural History of 
English Insects, namely, Moths and Butterflies. London, 
1778. folio. 
§ Moses Harris. An Essay preceding a Supplement to the 
