: V KliSITY 

 LfpORN^' 

 SYSTEMATIC ARRANGEMENT 

 OF INSECTS, 



THE necessity for an accurate methodical classifica- 

 tion by which living objects can he recognised and 

 their relations to each other in some measure indicated, 

 is even more strongly felt in regard to insects than 

 any other department of the animal kingdom. This 

 is occasioned by the great amount of their numbers, 

 which much exceeds that of any other of the zoolo- 

 gical classes. Most authors agree in affirming that 

 not fewer than between 80,000 and 100,000 species 

 are preserved in collections, and it is computed that 

 the species existing in nature is not greatly short of 

 400,000. But the very circumstance which makes a 

 well digested arrangement so desirable, likewise ren- 

 ders it of no easy attainment, owing to the difficulty 

 of acquiring the requisite knowledge of such a multi- 

 tude of objects. Their structural details are so end- 

 lessly diversified, their affinities and analogical rela- 

 tions so complex, and their modes of living, in many 

 cases, of such difficult determination., that it is scarcely 

 to be expected that a system will soon be constructed 

 in which each shall find its appropriate position, a 

 position at once forming a faithful index to all its most 

 characteristic and essential properties. How far some 



