192 MOVEMENTS PECULIAR TO INSECTS. 



Many other instances might be cited, both of common and 

 of remarkable movements, wherein insects do the like, while 

 they often do more than other animals. The above, however, 

 show sufficiently that the mechanisms of motion assigned to 

 some of the smallest of living forms are by no means inferior 

 to those bestowed on the largest, while we see in their mutual 

 resemblance an impress stamped on both, of their being the 

 work of one creative hand and mind. 



Having then observed, in these similitudes between what we 

 consider among the highest ; and what we are apt to look on 

 as among the lowest of the animated races, a very striking 

 exhibition of that unity of design apparent throughout the 

 works of nature, let us notice now a few of those peculiarities 

 (in respect of motion) which belong, or are supposed to belong, 

 to insects only, and admire in these the variety, the exhaustless 

 resources of contrivance and adaptation, which mark the in- 

 finitude of the One Creator. 



First, as walkers, there are some insects which deviate 

 remarkably from other creatures. The retrograde movements 

 of most animals are of an artificial character, and seem more 

 or less uneasily performed; whereas, in insects of nearly 

 every description, those especially which are wingless, to move 

 in all directions would seem as easy as to progress in one. 

 Those pretty little active flies, with two fringed and sometimes 

 spotted wings, best known as Midges,* such common fre- 



* PsyaTwda. 



