ALPHABET OF INSECTS. 61 



public lecturer on this particular branch, seemed of itself 

 a recommendation, especially to numbers of young persons, 

 who had been delighted with the wonders they had heard 

 of, for the first time, from the Professor's own lips. Every 

 circumstance, therefore, combining to induce the public to 

 patronize the Alphabet of Insects immediately on its appear- 

 ance, it becomes the duty of an impartial critic to point out 

 how far it is really worthy of that patronage : in doing this, we 

 shall excuse ourselves from making any comments on the 

 censures bestowed by the author on Cuvier, Latreille, Kirby, 

 MacLeay, Swainson, and other eminent naturalists, and 

 endeavour to ascertain whether his own knowledge of the 

 subject will warrant him in speaking of these gi-eat men so 

 disparagingly. 



We find, at p. 18, the antenncs of an insect called its ears, 

 without any previous explanation of the Professor's reasons 

 for making this grand alteration in the supposed use of an 

 organ ; an alteration which strikes an entomological reader as 

 forcibly as though he found in a figure, representing the human 

 fi-ame, the hands called eyes, or the eyes hands. Naturally 

 anxious for the explanation of so strange a supposition, we 

 searched through the book, and found the following para- 

 graphs bearing on the subject : — 



" The sense of touch has been, by many, supposed to reside in 

 the organs I have ventured to call the ears, which have thence been 

 termed feelers : but the evidence on which this rests is slight and 

 unsatisfactory ; for the bending of the ears forward, and moving 

 them in walking, seem to be for the purpose of listening." Pp.79, 80. 



" For the brief reasons assigned under ' Touch,' and for others 

 deduced from dissection and experiment, I have ventured to call the 

 ears two horn -like organs, always situated near the eyes, to which 

 various incongruous functions have been assigned. As I have little 

 doubt these organs will one day be proved to be ears, I think it will 

 direct attention more decidedly to them by at once terming them 

 ears, than by leaving them open to all sorts of crude fancies, so easy 

 to form, but so detrimental to correct inquiry." Pp. 80, 81. 



We request our reader to give his attention to this. The 

 bending of the antennce forward, and moving them in walk- 

 ing, is sufficient reason, the Professor thinks, for their being 

 considered ears ! The reasons deduced from dissection and 



