PREFACE. 



At the period when the first edition of this work was presented to the public, the study 

 of exotic insects, and indeed the science of Entomology itself, had made but little 

 progress in this country. The collections of Francillon, Drury, MacLeay, Sir J. 

 Banks, and Donovan, contained almost all that was then known of Indian Entomo- 

 logy, with which our Continental neighbours were then, as still, comparatively ignorant. 

 To these collections, examined by Fabricius himself, Donovan had free access, and his 

 figures of the insects therein contained, which had served as types for the descriptions 

 of the Entomologist of Kiel, are especially valuable. 



The progress of Entomology, as a science, has so much advanced, as to render a 

 republication of this work advisable ; at the same time, however, requiring that its 

 original Linnaean style should not be retained, but that it should be brought down to 

 the present state of science. This I have endeavoured to do, by rendering the specific 

 characters more detailed, the nomenclature more correct, the synonyms more nume- 

 rous, and the localities more precise. I have added many additional observations, 

 omitting nothing which appeared in the former at all likely to instruct or interest 

 the reader. Alphabetical and systematic indices of the work are introduced, as well as 

 numbers, both for the plates, and for the individual figures on each plate, which were 

 omitted in the former edition, which appeared in parts, commencing in the year 1800. 



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