414 
rOrULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
what is more, work them out thoroughly. The result will be, that Bur- 
lington House ” will have less painful associations in their reminiscences of 
e.xamination periods. 
BOOKS ON INSECTS.* 
D li. BACKABD has all but completed his fine treatise on insects generalK. 
We have received the last two parts (VI. and VII.), and can only 
speak of them as we have spoken of those which preceded them — in the most 
complimeutar}' terms. As a general treatise on Entomology, it is certainly 
the most comprehensive yet issued. .For, valuable and original as Kirby and 
Spence’s well known work is, it is somewhat unsystematic, is to a large 
extent anecdotal, and of course is immensely behind the present knowledge of 
the anatomy and development of the class Insecta. In the two parts on our 
table the author continues his account of the Lepidoptera, begins and com- 
pletes that of the Diptera, and gets through a good deal of the history of the 
Coleoptera. Numerous figures are scattered through the text, and Part VI. 
contains a very good steel-engraved pnge plate, delineating certain moths. 
The anatomy of the Diptera is very fully stated, and the author objects 
distinctly to the idea that the mosquito is provided with glands for the 
production of any poisonous fluid. 
Mr. Scudder’s memoir is another American work, and is of the very 
highest scientific order. It is not long, but it treats minutely on all the 
burrowing crickets, with the exception of Cylindrodes the minuter forms. 
It is further interesting from being the first part of the Transactions which 
the I’eabody Academy will in future publish. Mr. Scudder is too well 
known to European entomologists to need any praise of ours. We can only 
say, then, that those who know how searchingly patiently he conducts his 
re.«earches, will find in the present work only another instance of what 
scientific insect study ought to be. The large 4to. plate which accompanies 
the memoir is a good example of steel engraving, the central figure of 
GrylloUdpa Amtmlis being a little cJiof d' autre of zoological drawing. The 
other figures strike us as wanting in force, even though they are outlinear. 
Mr. Scudder describes in detail fifteen species of GryUoUdpa and eight species 
of Scfiptcrii^atf. The characters of the two genera are strikingly indicated by 
being placed side by side in parallel columns. 
Dr. Knagg’s little volume is interleaved with plain paper for the inser- 
tion of the reader's notes, and it is a mrdtum in purto of entomological 
“ hints and suggestions.” It is not a woik on the zoology of Lepidoptera, 
but it contains over a hundred pages of facts to be noted by those who study 
the order of butterflies. The author claseifies his observation in accordance 
• “ A fiuide to the Sttidy of Insects.” By A. S. Packard, .Tun., 1\I.D. Parts 
VI. and VII. .Salem. ISOl). 
Memoirs of the Peabody Academy. Pevision of the T>arge Stytated Fos- 
sorial Crickets.” By Samuel H. Scudder. Salem. 1809. 
“ The I^epidopterist’s Huide.” By II. Huard Knnggs, M.D., F.Ii.tS. Lon- 
don : Van Vcorst. 1809, 
