PREFACE. Vll 



species, or the examination of the remains of beings that have lived. 

 In furtherance of this wish I have penned an essay on the c Employ- 

 ment of Physiological Characters in the Classification of Animals.' 

 I wish naturalists to bear in mind that, as the possession of life is in 

 itself a grand general character, so are the modes of using and con- 

 tinuing life deserving of study, inasmuch as by their discrepancies 

 they furnish us with divisional characters. I am well aware that 

 there are those, especially in our museums, who reject and ridicule 

 the idea of going beyond the treasures of a museum for information. 

 By all such my views will be regarded as purely nonsensical ; but we 

 are not without men who weigh a matter before they pronounce an 

 opinion, — who say to themselves, Are these things true. Are we 

 right in disregarding truth ? Entomologists will not forget that some 

 years back, combining the characters of economy and metamor- 

 phosis with those of form, I argued the propriety of uniting Stylops 

 with the Coleoptera, the flea with the Diptera. Every one who 

 trusted implicitly to books pronounced my views absurd, untenable ; 

 and so they are when judged by books, but not if we appeal to Na- 

 ture : those who do appeal to Nature are with me to a man. It 

 was but the other day that Dr. Hagen emphatically pronounced that 

 Acentria nivea was lepidopterous ; since then an entomologist has 

 found its larva and pupa, and his observations, in the January ' Zoo- 

 logist,' will confirm the Doctor's views ; but a question of deeper inte- 

 rest is opened by these announcements. Why is not the entire tribe of 

 Phryganeina lepidopterous ? The cased larva is no objection ; the form 

 of pupa is no objection. Then turn to the perfect insect : the substi- 

 tution of hairs for scales is no objection ; the formula of wing-rays is 

 the same; the obsolete mouth is no objection ; indeed, when we seek 

 for a valid objection we cannot find a single character possessed by 

 Phryganea that has not already been pronounced unimportant in the 

 case of Psyche. I am aware how opposed this is to received 

 opinions, — how the works of Ingpen, Samouelle, Curtis, Stephens and 

 Westwood may be cited as conclusive against it. But, gentlemen, 

 go to Nature ; ask her ; watch the living animal, and then contest 

 the point ; make yourselves masters of the subject, and let the 



