SYSTEM OF INSECTS. 4-25 



its livery and general aspect: a circumstance which 

 evidently proves that it was part of the plan of the 

 CREATOR to place them in contrast with each other. Were 

 I to pursue this subject further, it might not be difficult 

 to show that were the tribes of Mandibulata or of Haus- 

 tellata also arranged in columns, analogies would be dis- 

 coverable between their corresponding points : this seems 

 to be Mr. MacLeay's opinion a ; and it is worth your 

 pursuing the subject further, which cannot but prove 

 very interesting. 



But though the general analogy of these columns is 

 that of Order to Order, yet individual species in each 

 Order sometimes find their representatives in a different 

 one from that with which they generally are contrasted ; 

 thus some Diptera, as Culex, by the scales on the veins 

 and other parts of their wings, are analogous to Lepi- 

 doptera rather than Hymenoptera b ; as is also the genus 

 Psychoda by its form. 



We come now to the consideration of a question not 

 easy to be decided, I mean, which Order of insects is 

 to have the precedency, and which is the connecting link 

 that unites them to Vertebrate animals. 



Linne (and Mr. MacLeay seems in this to coincide 

 with him) considered the Coleoptera as at the head of the 

 Class of insects ; De Geer thought the Lepidoptera en- 

 titled to that honour ; Latreille and Cuvier begin with 

 the Apt era : Marcel de Serres favours the Orthoptera c ; 

 and others, on account of their admirable economy, have 

 made the Hymenoptera the princes of the insect world d . 



a Hor. Entomolog. 437. VOL. III. p. 644. 



e Mem. du Mm. 1819, 136. < Riffcrschw. dc Ins* Genital. 9. 



