Transformations of Insects. 
CHAPTER I. 
THE INSECT WORLD. 
The beings which belong to the great zoological group of the 
Articulata are found in enormous numbers in nearly every part 
of the world. 
The articulate animals comprise those which the great Linnaeus 
called “insects” — that is to say, the true insects, the hundred-legs, 
the spiders, and the crabs. 
Insects existed in very remote geological ages, and their wings 
have been found beautifully preserved in the remains of those old 
forests and swamps which have been formed into coal. 
Thus early in the world’s history the beetle droned at eventide, 
and the merry chirp of the grasshopper was added to the song of 
Nature. Moreover, the hundred-legs of the period enjoyed the 
quietude of the great tree stems, and many a spider spread its web 
on the ferns and the close underwood. Coal is dug up from depths 
of hundreds of fathoms, and is covered by sediments which are the 
remains of old continents, and sea bottoms, the thickness of which 
is a measure of the time they took to form ; yet so far back in 
the annals of Nature the tiny insects came from the egg, lived as 
gormandising grubs, changed into sleepy pupae, and burst forth 
into lively winged creatures. Ever since, and during all the 
successive changes of the world’s surface, insect life has manifested 
itself, and now articulate animals are found everywhere. 
B 
