68 METAMORPHOSES. 



the artificial coverings of different kinds, whether of silk, 

 wood, or earth, &c. which many insects of the other 

 orders fabricate for themselves previously to assuming 

 the pupa state, and which have been called by different 

 writers, pods, cods, hush, and beans, I shall continue the 

 more definite French term cocon, anglicized into cocoon*. 



After remaining a shorter or longer period, some 

 species only a few hours, others months, others one or 

 more years, in the pupa state, the inclosed insect, now 

 become mature in all its parts, bursts the case which in- 

 closed it, quits the pupa, and enters upon the fourth and 

 last state. 



We now see it (unless it be an apterous species) fur- 

 nished with wings, capable of propagation, and often 

 under a form altogether different from those which it has 

 previously borne a perfect beetle, butterfly, or other 

 insect. This Linne termed the imago state, and the 

 animal that had attained to it the imago / because, 

 having laid aside its mask, and cast off its swaddling 

 bands, being no longer disguised or confined, or in any 

 respect imperfect, it is now become a true representative 

 or image of its species. This state is in general referred 

 to when an insect is spoken of without the restricting 

 terms larva or pupa. 



Such being the singularity of the transformations of 

 insects, you will not think the ancients were so wholly 

 unprovided with a show of argument as we are accus- 

 tomed to consider them, for their belief in the possibility 

 of many of the marvellous metamorphoses which their 

 poets recount. Utterly ignorant as they were of modern 

 physiological discoveries, the conversion of a caterpillar 



" PLATE XVII. FIG. 5-10. 



