164 ON SYSTEMATIC ZOOLOGY. 
ciples of the learned Swede have relaxed, in this in- 
stance, from their accustomed dread of innovation, by 
making several genera not to be found in the works of 
their master. 
(217.) Looking to this list, we perceive that the sys- 
tem is not only more natural than any which preceded 
it, but that nearly all the great families made by more 
recent entomologists are named and characterised under 
the denomination of genera. The combination of these 
groups, however, in many instances are obviously intended 
to be artificial: this is most conspicuous in the order 
Coleoptera, where our illustrious author truly judged, 
that as the differences in the antenne furnished one of 
the most obvious distinctions among insects, so a classi- 
fication founded chiefly upon those organs among beetles 
would offer the greatest facilities to the ready deter- 
mination of the genera, In judging, therefore, of the 
entomological system before us, we should bear this in 
mind, since it cannot for a moment be supposed that 
such a writer as Linneus, if he had not this object in 
view, would have placed Buprestis after Cicindela, or, 
Necydelis after Carabus ; still less that he could have 
fancied any natural affinity between Si/pha and Cocci- 
nella, or Elater and Cicindela. 'The Coleoptera, in 
fact, is nearly the only order where he found it necessary 
to group his genera into purely artificial sections, in order 
that they might more easily be determined. In his 
other orders these subdivisions were not necessary, and 
we accordingly find the genera following each other in 
a much more natural series.* On this point Mr. Kirby 
has justly observed, that, in general, Linneus had such 
a tact for discovering natural groups, that in him it 
seems almost to have been intuitive.t : 
(218.) The Vermes consiitute the last class of the 
Systema Nature, under which are comprehended all 
animals whose bodies are not furnished with limbs. As 
it is curious to perceive how Linneus contrived to bring 
* Except in Hemintera, + Int. to Ent. vol. iv. p. 440. 
