PREFACE. 
XI 
keener relish for physiological researches. That truth was at 
all times eagerly sought after, a frequent correspondence with 
the author during several years furnished suitable opportuni- 
ties for ascertaining. 
In the science of Entomology, several meritorious efforts were 
at this time made to illustrate the characters of the native spe- 
cies. The Entomologia Britamiica of Marsham, London, 
180^, embraced the extensive tribes of Coleopterous Insects, and 
in which he described many new species, and greatly elucidated 
the characters of those previously known. In the following 
year, Mr Haworth commenced his Lepidoptera Britanmca^ a 
work containing much important information ; but now, from its 
scarcity, of difficult access to the student. 
It was not to be expected in a country in which such anato- 
mists as Harvey and Tyson, and such zoologists as Wil- 
loughby, Ray, Lister, and Sibbald had flourished, that the 
Artificial Method would universally supersede the study of the 
anatomy and physiology of animals. During this dark age, 
one individual, John Hunter, upheld, in his own labours, the 
dignity of the science, and left behind him a museum which, to 
this period, is unrivalled as a display of zeal, patience, and phy- 
siological attainment. At the same period, the University of 
Edinburgh possessed, in Dr Monro secundiis, a comparative 
anatomist and physiologist, anxious to inspire a taste for the 
science in the minds of his numerous pupils, and to extend its 
boundaries by personal exertion. 
Even among the naturalists of this country, there were always 
a few whom the fetters of the Linnean school could not bind ; but 
whose labours were too confined in their object, to exercise any ge- 
neral influence on the spirit of the age. Mr Kirby, in his Mono-’ 
graphiaApumAnglife, Ipswich, 1802, set an example to his coun- 
trymen of acuteness and patience in unfolding the structure and 
habits of those insects to which he had directed his attention ; 
and he has recently increased his claims to the gratitude of Bri- 
tish naturalists, by composing, along with Mr Spence, the In- 
troduction to Entomology. In another quarter of the island, 
Mr Dalyell, in his Observations on PlanaricE, Edin. 1814, 
exhibited a happy facility of investigating the habits of aquatic 
h 2 
