9 
BRITISH APHIDES. 
says, Tlie productions of the mind and hands seem 
exceedingly numerous in books and works, yet all this 
variety arises from the particular subtilising upon and 
applying a few known things, &c.” 
Searchers into the secrets of nature have acknow- 
ledged the wisdom of not neglecting the import of 
small things, for who shall gauge the possible scope of 
their action in nature’s operations ? 
The remark is almost trite, that the history of a 
country is but poorly represented by recounting its 
wars of offence and defence, thus setting forth, almost 
exclusively, what may be called the barbarian successes 
of its inhabitants. The additional exposition of the 
development of its political and social laws better 
entitles such a treatise to the name of history, but 
even here the labour is incomplete, unless the develop- 
ment of science, under the capacities of its people, is 
duly set-forth, and the secrets of their wellbeing traced 
to the scientific energy of its members, whose originality 
of thought has enabled them to keep in the van of 
nations. Thus they prove the truth of the aphorism 
that ‘‘knowledge is strength.” 
To the economist the study of Entomology can 
hardly stand second in importance. These latter 
years have furnished us with examples of the extra- 
ordinary development and migration of insects of almost 
microscopic dimensions. Some kinds have marched 
thousands of miles in the course of a few years, and 
threatened the food of whole countries. Did not 
science show that natural checks after a time arise to 
restore the balance of life, we might well fear famine 
from the attacks of such minute insect pests as infest 
the wheat, the potato, and the vine. 
It is now more than one hundred and thirty years 
since Reaumer, and subsequently Charles Bonnet, 
began observing Aphides. Some might think that the 
facts to be obtained from such insects might soon 
be investigated, and that the well of inquiry in this 
direction would soon be fathomed. To disprove such 
