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before zoological science became locked fast in the paralysing grip of 
pure systematics. When we read Réaumur or De Geer, the whole 
point of view is entirely familiar. In describing some of the wonderful 
means of defence of the larva of Cerura vinula, De Geer merely speaks 
of the “‘ caterpillar of the sallow.’’ Our sympathies are with Lyonnet, 
who carefully describes the anatomy of ‘ the caterpillar which eats the 
wood of the willow.”” These men were naturalists, interested in the 
infinitely difficult and infinitely numerous problems presented by 
living nature. We find the same spirit in the early Darwinian 
writers ; it shines forth clearly not only in the bionomic monographs, 
but also illuminates the systematic papers of Bates, Wallace, and 
Trimen, and now it has become the common heritage of entomology. 
Systematic work is as ‘‘ useful and necessary ’’ as ever, indeed even 
more so, for it becomes a necessity not only as an end in itself, but 
as the foundation for endless other inquiries. This, then, is the great 
gain which British entomology owes to Darwin’s influence, received 
first through the early Darwinian writers, and then through the energy 
and ability of Raphael Meldola—that we are inspired to become 
naturalists and observers, rather than collectors, that we describe and 
distinguish species as the means for knowing more about them as living 
animals, and that endless new lines of observation are opened up to us 
from the high vantage ground which we occupy as firm believers in 
the doctrine of evolution and the process of natural selection as its 
motive cause. 
