190 REAUMUR. 



some, afford pleasure to the person who engages in 

 them. They do more, — they necessarily raise the 

 mind to admire the Author of so many wonders. 

 Ought we to be ashamed of ranking among our 

 occupations observations and researches, of which 

 the object is an acquaintance with the works on 

 which the Supreme Being has displayed a bound- 

 less wisdom, and varied to such a degree ? Natural 

 history is the history of his works; nor is there 

 any demonstration of his existence more intelligible 

 to all men than that which it furnishes." 



The two first volumes treat of caterpillars, 

 their forms and habits, their metamorphoses into 

 butterflies, and the insects which attack them, or 

 which live within their bodies. The third speaks 

 of the small creatures named moths, which exist 

 in the interior of the substances which they devour, 

 or form of them coverings for their protection. It 

 also contains the history of the aphides, a very nu- 

 merous race of small insects, which suck the juices 

 of trees and plants, live in society, and are often 

 productive of great damage. These animalcules are 

 especially remarkable for their mode of generation ; 

 it having been proved by M. Bonnet, that a single 

 impregnation is sufficient for the production of many 

 successive generations, and that they are viviparous 

 in summer and oviparous in autumn. The flies 

 which produce the excrescences named gall-nuts, 

 and the worms from which come the dipterous in- 

 sects, so diversified in their forms, manners, and 

 places of abode, occupy the fourth volume. The 

 fifth contains, among other genera, the bees, of 

 which the history is so singular and interesting. 



