BOOKS ON ENTOMOLOGY. 5 



that these " Minims of Creation" are something, even in them- 

 selves ; but it may be well, meanwhile, for him who would 

 bring them into general notice, to invest them with the charm 

 of adventitious interest and reflected consequence. Insects are 

 peculiarly capable of being thus treated ; for in their analogies 

 and correspondences, illustrative and emblematic, innumerable 

 are their relations with other things, from the most trifling 

 objects of the world we live in, up to the highest subjects of 

 human contemplation. Multiplied then, and still multiplying, 

 as are books on Entomology, we venture to think there is yet 

 scope and use for one of a character more discursive, a book 

 not professing to teach the science, but to persuade to its 

 study those who may have time and opportunity for the pur- 

 suit ; and to show those who have not, that they may, never- 

 theless, find interest and pleasure in common observation (not 

 commonly exercised) of the insect million by which they are 

 surrounded. With a confidence that some such work might 

 be generally read, though by no means equally assured of our 

 ability to write one, we long had wavering thoughts of making 

 the attempt. At last we resolved to try, reminded by a re- 

 turning epoch (a brush, en passant, from the wing of time) 

 that while we doubt and linger, 



" La vie a differer se passe." 



The end of the year was at hand : " To-morrow," said we to 

 ourselves, " we will really begin our work for everybody about 

 Insects. This very evening shall be devoted to a final decision 



VOL. L 2. 



