54 Life and Love. 



VII. 



METAMORPHOSIS OF INSECTS. 



STRANGE as it may seem to the casual ob- 

 server, first cousin to the lobster's family is 

 the great family of Insects ; a wonderful family in 

 its variety and complexity, and particularly re- 

 markable in its reproductive organization. 



Life finds its culmination in love, nowhere more 

 wonderfully than among the insects. 



With many of them it is literally true that to 

 love is to die. This is so, we remember, with the 

 spirogyra; it is so with countless of the low forms 

 of life ; even among the fishes the great trans- 

 formation is often followed by death ; but nowhere 

 is this sequence more tragic than among the 

 insects. 



Strange indeed is the life of the insect ! In the 

 vast majority of cases its whole existence appears 

 to be but a preparation for a brief moment of 

 transcendent life, — followed speedily by total ex- 

 tinction. 



As an egg it starts upon its precarious career. 

 Its parent places it as well as she can ; places, 



