12 DEFINITION OF THE TERM INSECT. 
volume, he has distributed the Jnvertebrata in a double 
subramose series—one consisting of articulate, and the 
other of inarticulate animals*. 
Upon Lamarck’s system, most of the modern ones, 
with some variation, are founded. There is one, how- 
ever, by a learned countryman of ours, that is more 
unique, sui generis, and I may add profound, than any 
that has yet appeared. I am speaking of that, you will 
perceive, of which our friend Mr. Wm. MacLeay has 
given a detailed statement in his Hore Entomologice. 
In this he goes even far beyond what Lamarck has at- 
tempted in the above sketch, and substantiates his claim 
to be considered as one of those original thinkers, rarz 
nantes in gurgite vasto, that do not appear every day. 
The following are the principal bases of his system. 
1. That all natural groups, whether kingdoms or any 
subdivision of them, return into themselves ; a distribu- 
tion which he expresses by circles. 
2. That each of these circles is formed precisely of 
jive-groups, each of which is resolvable into five other 
smaller groups, and so on. : E 
3. That proximate circles or larger groups are con- 
nected. by the intervention of lesser groups, which he de- 
nominates osculant>. 
4, That there are relations of analogy between the 
corresponding points of contiguous circles, 
2 Anim. sans Vertebr. i, 457. 
> In a note in his paper, On certain general Laws, &c. (Linn. 
Trans. xiv. 57. Mr. W.S. MacLeay observes, ‘‘ Perhaps, indeed, the 
most clear method of expressing ourselves on this subject is to say 
that, laying aside usculant groups, every natural group is divisible 
into five, which always admits of a binary distribution, that is into 
two and three. 
