INSECTS FOUND ON HAMPSTEAD HEATH. 93 



A goodly assemblage ! will, I expect, be the exclamation of 

 many upon seeing this list ; but I honestly assure them, that 

 every individual insect has been captured by myself within a 

 circumference of less than five miles upon the Hampstead and 

 Highgate district. I can promise them equal success if they 

 will but work as hard as I have done. My only instrument 

 has been a bag-net ; and all my captures I secure in small pill- 

 boxes, for I care not to say that I dread impaling an insect 

 alive. If we allow ourselves extraordinary latitude in tracing 

 systematic analogies, let us make one step further, and con- 

 ceive analogies of feeling to exist; — if erroneous (as has 

 strongly been endeavoured to be proved, but never satisfac- 

 torily) we certainly err on the right side — that of humanity — 

 which I feel well rewarded for having respected, by the beau- 

 tiful condition of the insects in my collection. I advise the 

 collector not to be deterred by the fear of having this sen- 

 timent styled morbid, for it is a duty to be as summary as 

 possible in the destruction of life, when it is rendered essential 

 to the pursuit of science. The development of man's intellect 

 is of more importance than the life of any subordinate creature, 

 although for its attainment we are not privileged to give unne- 

 cessary pain by inflicting a lingering death. It is very evident 

 that they possess feeling, although, perhaps, remote in its 

 acuteness to our's; therefore, to refer the contortions of an 

 impaled insect to mere impatience of restraint, is, I take it, a 

 bitter sarcasm upon the obtuseness of our own sensibility. 



I hope the above list will induce collectors to consider those 

 places worth their attention, and I wish them more success 

 than I have myself met with ; but to insure it, they must be 

 assiduous. 



Yours, &c. 



29, Grove Street, Camden Town. W. E. SHUCKARD. 



