FORM AND COLOITR OF INSECTS. 17 



not, on the present occasion, lay much stress upon 

 this recommendation. I would rather allow the 

 study to win you to itself, by the permanence of the 

 agreeable ideas it is calculated to excite. One 

 source of these ideas is the form and the colouring 

 of insects : and any one who attempts to describe 

 such characteristics, may exclaim, as Thomson has 

 done of the flowers of spring, 



" Oh ! what can language do ! " 



Kirby and Spence, with that enthusiasm which 

 their knowledge of the subject both creates and 

 justifies, remark, " To these, her valued miniatures, 

 Nature has given the most delicate touch and highest 

 finish of her pencil. Numbers she has armed with 

 glittering mail, which reflects a lustre like that of 

 burnished metals ; in others she lights up the 

 dazzHng radiance of polished gems. Some she has 

 decked with what looks like liquid drops or plates of 

 gold or silver, or with scales or pile, which mimic 

 the colour and emit the ray of the same precious 

 metals." 



" Their colours also are not evanescent and fugi- 

 tive, but fixed and durable, surviving their subject, 

 and adorning it as much after death as they did 

 when it was alive." In this respect the Entomologist 

 possesses an advantage over most of his brother natu- 



c 



