LAlifCASTEIl cor NTT. 46S) 



^Ithoug-h they do not possess the brilliant beauty of the Lepi- 

 doptera, or butterfly order, they have hitherto secured the prio- 

 cipal attention of entomologists ; whence it happens that they 

 are best known, and we have devoted more space to them than 

 to the remaining orders. 



The Colcoptera deserve a careful study, as a knowledge of 

 their habits will enable us to turn them to account in the de- 

 struction of noxious species. Thus the genus Coccinella (la- 

 dybug) feeds upon the Aphides or plant lice, so destructive to 

 roses and other plants ; and in their larva state they may be 

 found upon the leaves of useful vegetables, devouring small 

 insects or grubs \vhich, when numerous, destroy the plants by 

 eating the leaves. The Cecidomyia destructor (wheat fly) is 

 extensively destroyed in the grub state, by the young of 

 another minute insect. The carnivorous tribes are readily 

 distinguishable from those which feed upon vegetable food ; 

 and the greater number and variety of the former to be found 

 in gardens and fields, the more likely will they be to destroy 

 the noxious kinds, or to prevent their increase by the destruc- 

 tion of their eggs. 



There can be no necessity in giving common names to ani- 

 mals which have not already received them, as they can be just 

 as well recognized by the scientific name. Common names are 

 frequently local, and the same name is applied to different an- 

 imals in diiferent parts of the country; whilst the scientific 

 name, being that under which animals are described, are 

 known in all parts of the world, whatever may be the language 

 spoken. The English apply the name ground-hog to an Afri- 

 can animal not at all like our ground-hog, which some authors- 

 call by a name under which most people would not recognize 

 it. One of our hawks is called a buzzard in England, and our 

 buzzard a vulture. A mammal is called gopher in the vvest» 

 and the same vulgar name is applied to a tortoise in the south. 

 In a work upon North American birds, one author has called 

 our Hirundo rufa (barn swallow) chimney swallow! doubtless 

 because it is like the chimney swallow of England ; instead of 

 preserving this name for the Chcetura pelasgia, which actually 

 frequents chimneys. Bald eagle is the common name for Ha- 

 Jiatceus leucocephalus throughout the United States, yet some 

 people affectedly call it the whiteheaded eagle ! Thus it some- 



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