30 



TRANSFORMATIONS OF INSECTS. 



belief of the age in which Shakspeare lived ; and it 

 was not until near the conclusion of the sixteenth 

 century, that it was proved by the experiments of 

 Redi to be utterly groundless. This forms one 

 example of the progress of human knowledge in 

 destroying " that labyrinth of idle fancies and unsup- 

 ported fables, which, entangled with one another like 

 a Gordian knot, have even to this day obscured 

 the beautiful simplicity of this part of Natural 

 History."* 



Tlie vertebrate animals by which we are surrounded 

 retain through life, with some variations in size and 

 colouring, very nearly the same form they had at 



Chrysalis and Caterpillar of the Magpie Moth. 



their birth. Insects, on the contrary, have their 

 parts and powers progressively developed, and pass 



* Swammerdam, Book of Nature, p. 223. 



