134 DIRECTIONS FOR COLLECTING, ETC. 



containing a chrysalis, from ^vllich eventually issues a small fly, which, in its turn, seeks some unhappy caterpillar, 

 and, by means of its sharp ovipositor, places a number of eggs in its body, which, quickly hatched by the warmth, 

 feed upon its vitals till it is destroyed. The ichneumon of the small silken cocoons, mentioned above, seems to 

 confine its ravages to the caterpillars of the cabbage-white butterfly ; but each species has its peculiar foe of this 

 description, some large and some small, the former depositing only one or two eggs in the body of each caterpillar, 

 the latter from ten or twelve to near a hundred : I have seen a caterpillar of the lacquey moth wince under the 

 repeated punctures of its ichneumon foe, till it has at last fallen from the branch upon which it was feeding ; it, 

 however, socm resumes its food, doubtless with redoubled rapacity, to satisfy the insatiate legion within, till, over- 

 come by exhaustion, it crawls away to fix itself in some solitary place, where the chrysalis is found. 



After the season of collecting is entirely over, or when bad weather confines the student to the house, he may 

 occupy his leisure time in arranging his collection ; and I would strenuously advise him to do so, not merely as a 

 pretty display of beautiful objects, but with due regard tf> nomenclature and system. Doubtless the most deeply 

 interesting portion of natural history is the observation of the habits, physiology, structure, and properties of 

 organised creatures (by far the greater number of which belong to the entomological division), but their proper 

 and convenient arrangement, according to the most recent terms and system of science, is absolutely necessary 

 for the successful progress and application of all knowledge ; and even those who are confining themselves to the 

 arrangement of the mere nomenclature of the catalogue, are doing good service to the advancement of the science. 

 The elaborate and searching observations of Reaumur and Bonnet ViJould have been much more valuable had they 

 been conducted with such a view to system and arrangement ; whilst as it is, (as mentioned in Kirby and Spence's 

 Introduction) some of the insects of which they have recorded the most interesting circumstances, cannot, from 

 their neglect of system, be at this day ascertained. No one, for instance, knew Reaumur's Ahcille tapissiere until 

 Latreille, happily combining system with attention to the economy of insects, proved it to lie a new species. 

 Megachile Papaveris. Even with the assistance of carefully-coloured portraits, it is almost impossible so to 

 describe insects as to render them recognisable witli certainty, unless the accepted terms and system of science 

 be also employed ; and Mr. Westwood, in his Entomologist's Text-Book, alludes to the fact that many rare 

 insects, of which engraved portraits have been given by the early entomologists, have from this cause been 

 thought to be new species. 



Kirby and Spenco affirm that a well-arranged system, with proper terms and names, is as necessary to the 

 understanding of a science as is a dictionary to the understanding of a foreign language. "The labours of a 

 Michaelis or a Laplace might be sealed books to us without dictionaries of the French and German languages; and 

 in fact a good system of insects, containing all the known species, arranged in appropriate genera, families, 

 orders, and classes, is in reality a dictionary, enabUng us (without the incalculable loss of time which would other- 

 wise occur) to ascertain the name of any given insect, and thus to learn all that has been recorded of its properties 

 and history, as readily as we determine the meaning of a word in a lexicon." 



As far as regards the systematic position of any insect connected with the order treated of in the ]>rcscnt 

 volume, the student will have, comparatively, little trouble. The veriest tyro will at once know that any 

 hutterjji/ or moth must belong to the order Lepidoptera. He will perceive that as a huttcrjlii it must belong to the 

 section Diurna ; a few striking characteristics will show him to which family ho must refer it, and it then only 

 remains to ascertain its genus ; and supposing it to belong to the genus I'cmessa, it will not be at all difficult to 



