ENTALIUM ENTOMOLOGY. 



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in the East and West Indies, belonging to Polygamia 

 Moiitecia, and to the natural order Leguminosts. 

 Generic character : flowers polygamous ; calyx bell- 

 shaped, five-toothed ; petals small and oblong ; sta- 

 mens ten or more, elongated ; anthers roundish ; pod 

 very large, compressed, jointed ; valves often sepa- 

 rated in two by a membrane. These are climbing 

 Elants, and have been called mimosas by several 

 otanists ; and by Forster, one of them was called 

 Aflenanthera, They are treated as stove plants and 

 propagated by cuttings. The chief peculiarity of 

 these plants is the immense size of the pods, those 

 of one variety are six or eight feet long, and, being 

 gently curved, resemble gigantic ci meters. Their 

 seeds are nearly six inches in circumference. 



ENTALIUM (De France). A fossil species of 

 shell, of the genus Dentalium. It includes such species 

 us have the tube narrowed near its orifice, with an 

 interior tube throughout its length. The Dentalium 

 duplicaliim illustrates this genus. 



ENTKLEA (R. Brown). A deciduous tree, native 

 of New Zealand, introduced in 1820. It belongs to 

 the natural order Tiliacece; is treated as a greenhouse 

 plant, where it flowers, and occasionally ripens seeds, 

 bv which it is propagated as well as by cuttings. 



"ENTOMOLOGY. That portion of zoological 

 science, which treats of the insect tribes, as restricted 

 by the knowledge obtained by the elaborate re- 

 searches of modern comparative anatomists. The 

 term is derived from two Greek words, cntomon, 

 an insect, and lugos, a discourse ; the former word, 

 as well as the synonymous Latin word, insectum, 

 which we have Anglicised into insect, being them- 

 selves compounded of other words, signifying a cut- 

 ting or dividing into sections or articulations, 

 whence, in fact, we arrive at one of the great cha- 

 racteristics of these tribes, namely, the articulated 

 structure of the external parts of the body, which 

 being of a corneous texture, serve as supports for the 

 muscles and other internal organs, just as the internal 

 vertebras of the higher animals support the same 

 parts ; so that in these portions of the invertebrata, the 

 external covering may properly be regarded as the 

 skeleton. Now this character joined to those derived 

 from the respiratory, nervous, and locomotive sys- 

 tems, tend to separate the true articulated animals 

 from a ureat number of other small creatures, with 

 which, under the common name of insects, they are 

 il, even in some of the latest popular compen- 

 cliunis of natural history which have issued from the 

 press, in which the leech and snail, together with many 

 of the still lower animals, are introduced, without even 

 a sectional note of distinction, amongst insects. 



If we look around, on every side, in every place, 

 and in every season, we behold the immense pro- 

 fusion with which nature has scattered the objects 

 of our present meditation over this world of ours. 

 The earth, the water, and the air, teem with insect 

 inhabitants ; every vegetable supports numerous 

 colonies ; the diminutive fungus and the gigantic 

 oak are alike subject to their attacks ; and as a proof 

 of the vast extent of the series, it may be added, that 

 Saint Pierre tells us, that several hundred different 

 species of insects visited a small rose-tree placed in 

 the window of his study, whilst a single forest tree 

 is the abode of numerous tribes and families. In 

 like manner they cease not in their attacks upon 

 animal matter, both in a dead and living state ; and, 

 as we have already had occasion to mention in these 

 pages, man himself, the lord of all, is not exempt 



from annoyances from them. How necessary, then, 

 from the insurmountable difficulty resulting from the 

 almost infinite numbers of these creatures, is it that 

 we should bespeak the indulgence of our readers in 

 our attempt to lay before them, in as concise a man- 

 ner as possible, a sketch of the insect world. It is 

 not difficult to imagine the painful nature of the 

 researches necessary for obtaining a knowledge of 

 the internal anatomy and other peculiarities of crea- 

 tures, of which by far the greater portion do not 

 exceed an inch in length. And here it is that 

 we, in the most especial manner, discover the inva- 

 luable worth of the microscope, that surprising instru- 

 ment, by which the minute wonders of the creation 

 are brought as vividly before the eye of the observer, 

 as are the wonders of the celestial sphere by that 

 other philosophical wonder, the telescope. These 

 instruments are now, it is true, no novelties ; but we 

 know no more striking instances in which the powers 

 of the mind have worked a victory over nature. 

 Speak of the powers of the steam-engine, and the 

 many hundred times by which the manual forces 

 of the human frame are increased by its operations 

 and what is this in comparison with the tens of 

 thousands of times to which the ordinary size of the 

 meanest insect is increased by the assistance of the 

 microscope ? Still the continued employment of this 

 instrument is a painful operation, increased a thou- 

 sand fold by the minuteness of the objects, and the 

 extent to which it is necessary to carry the inves- 

 tigation of them. Look at the unwearied labours of 

 Lyonnet, which were for years devoted to the 

 anatomical examination of a single insect ; or of 

 those of Straus-Durckheim, whose memoir upon the 

 cockchafer exhibits almost an equal endurance of 

 observation. If, moreover, we consider that not only 

 does an insect combine within itself the systems of 

 respiration, circulation, digestion, secretion, and sensa- 

 tion, analogous to those of the higher animals, but also 

 that owing to the remarkable circumstance that the 

 majority of these animals undergo a series of trans- 

 formations, whereby these systems are completely 

 altered several times in their progress to the perfect 

 state, it is essential to extend our observations to 

 every period of the life of the animal, before we can 

 arrive at a perfect knowledge of its structure, so as to 

 enable us to form a proper estimate of its comparative 

 anatomy ; we cannot, therefore, but admit that the 

 difficulties attending the labours of the entomologist 

 are not fewer than those in any other department of 

 nature ; difficulties, which, from their very nature, 

 cannot cease to arouse the attention of the devoted 

 lover of nature. And hence arises the necessity of 

 our having recourse to the labours of our prede- 

 cessors in the vast field opened to us, and in the 

 works of Svvammerdam and Lyonnet, De Geer and 

 Reaumur, Latreille and Kirby, we find the materials, 

 not for a short essay, as ours must be, at its greatest 

 extent, but for volumes upon volumes. 



Of all the classes of zoology, then, that of insects is 

 the most numerous, the most beautiful, and the most 

 varied ; and though it cannot be denied that no por- 

 tion of the science presents to those who arc igno- 

 rant of its merits, so many apparent points of repug- 

 nance ; yet which, nevertheless, so much captivates 

 the attention the more its merits are examined. It 

 is, indeed, for those who undertake its investigation, 

 an unceasing source of instruction and of pleasure, 

 open to all, requiring not, like the classes of quadru- 

 peds or birds, great pecuniary sacrifices in the col- 



