ENTOMOLOGICAL. 85 



very day; and he will see that not real, but figurative 

 locusts were here intended, and he will be reminded of a 

 similar figure in that remarkable prophecy of Moses,* 

 where, before the children of Israel entered Canaan, the 

 punishment which would follow their disobedience was 

 said to be by sending the hornet to drive them out and 

 destroy them, and, as we here have a carefully prepared 

 specimen of the hornet, we may close these Biblical 

 remarks with its examination. 



Yes, it is quite true, I do like to associate the works 

 of God with His Word. They are to me, exactly what 

 the most scientific of my books are, complete in this 

 respect, that all the letterpress is confined to one volume, 

 and all the illustrations to the other. 



Now, if you will just look on the label of our object, 

 the hornet, you will find it marked "Vespa" this 

 being the entomological name for the insect ; but vespa 

 is only an abbreviation of Vespasian, meaning the same 

 thing, as " Tom " is an abbreviation for " Thomas." And 

 was it not after the Israelites had reached the height 

 of wickedness, when they killed the Prince of Life, that, 

 in A.D. 70, the Emperor of Eome, Vespasian, destroyed 

 their city, which from that time to this has never been 

 restored to them ? 



The hornet is the largest European species of the 

 family of the Vespidse, to which the whole tribe of wasps 

 belong. We may almost read the character of theKoman 

 Emperor, Vespasian, in Webster's dictionary, where, in 

 explaining the word "waspish," we may read "petulant; 

 irritable ; irascible ; quick to resent any trifling afront : " 

 to which he might have added, " cruel," for a greater act 

 of cruelty was never performed by any one human being 

 upon another than what is said Titus, Vespasian's son, 



* Deut. vii. 20, compare with Numb, xxiii. 56. 



