MADAME MERIAN. 19 



Insect forms, their singularity and surpassing beauty, which, 

 in the same era, inspired the artistic pencil of a Merian, and 

 induced her, with a woman's energy, to cross the seas, and 

 brave the noxious climate of Surinam, for the sake of its 

 curious and splendid Insects. These she has as truthfully 

 depicted ;* though misled, perhaps, by her own enthusiasm 

 into a too ready credence of the marvellous, the accuracy of 

 her accompanying descriptions has been more than questioned. 

 Thus in the latter end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th 

 centuries, a few among the -most highly endowed with talent, 

 learning, and piety, considered the study of Entomology not 

 unworthy to constitute the grand pursuit of life ; yet, at this 

 very period, in such low estimation was it generally held, nay 7 

 so extravagant or childish was it deemed, that we are told by 

 Kirby of an attempt to set aside the will of a rational woman 

 (Lady Glanville) on the ground of lunacy, evinced solely by 

 her fondness for collecting Insects. Eay himself had to appear 

 as a witness of her sanity. How was it that his own escaped 

 impeachment ? For all this, and calmly smiling at the scoffs of 

 the vulgar ignorant and vulgar learned, Entomology marched 

 on steadily, supported by a phalanx of staunch professors, such 

 as Reaumur (called the French Pliny), Lyonnet, Bonnet, Gould, 

 the historian of English Ants, the Swede, Baron de Geer, and 

 at the head of all, his illustrious countryman, Linnaeus. Of 

 the previous labours of Ray and Swammerdam, the chief had 



* Insects of Surinam. 



