Fabre's Writings 



that he is especially attracted by the four- 

 winged flies, the Wasps and wild Bees, the 

 Dung-Beetles and Necrophori, the Mantes, 

 Grasshoppers, and Scorpions; but this is not 

 because of any particular affection for this 

 group or on account of their quality of Hy- 

 menoptera, Coleoptera, and Orthoptera ; for 

 many of their congeners are neglected and 

 many insects are selected out of their order. 

 This is bound to be the case, for the official 

 classification is conceived on totally different 

 lines to his own, going by the form of the 

 insect without heeding its actions and its 

 habits. It is much the same with the official 

 nomenclature. 



" If, by chance, an amalgam of Greek or 

 Latin gives a meaning which alludes to its 

 manner of life, the reality is very often in 

 disagreement with the name, because the 

 classifier, working over a necropolis, has 

 outstripped the observer, whose attention is 

 fixed upon the community of the living." 1 



So the historian of the insects takes the 

 greatest liberties with official science and 

 the official language. 



A Spider is not an insect, according to the rules 

 of classification; and as such the Epeira seems out 



1 Souvenirs, x., p. 79. 



327 



