128 BRITISH BEES. 



metropolis of a species — another term in use — is the 

 centralization of the general habitat -where the insect 

 either nidificates collectively with its fellows^ or, where, 

 from any other cause, it may be found in its season, 

 usually in profusion. But good fortune does not always 

 attend the discovery of this locality. 



It is by the acquired skill of perceiving habit, that 

 a large and confused collection may be sorted rapidly, 

 or fresh captures immediately placed with their conge- 

 ners, without the necessity of going tediously through 

 all the descriptive characteristics. Incidental errors are 

 afterwards speedily corrected. It is then that the specific 

 character exhibits its utility by enabling us at once to dis- 

 tinguish the new from the old. 



The concentration and summary of the specific cha- 

 racter is the name of the species, or trivial name as it 

 is sometimes called, which is, as it were, the baptismal 

 designation that attaches to it always afterwards, and is 

 contemporaneous with the introduction of the creature 

 into the series of recognized beings. 



Upon the revival of the study of natural history, when 

 learning dawned after the night of the Middle Ages, 

 much difficulty attached to the imposition of discrimi- 

 native names. The works of the ancients were ransacked, 

 and endeavours made to verify and apply the names they 

 had used. Ray published a vocabulary of such names. 

 But the ancients never studied natural history in the sys- 

 tematic way pursued by the moderns ; they did not want 

 the skill, but they wanted the facilities. Anatomy and 

 physiology had not made the progress necessary to aid 

 them in the pursuit, and the assistance all these sciences 

 obtain from optical instruments was barred from them. 

 The names they gave to natural objects were vernacular 



