PREFACE. 
3 
nescent indication of varieties . In the present work therefore 
nothing has been neglected which it appeared would be use- 
ful to enable the student to study the structure and affinities 
of the smallest, as well as the larger groups of every Order, 
by a consideration of their various parts. 
In the progress of my engagement I eventually found that 
more had been undertaken than I should have time or power 
to perform ; I was therefore again compelled to circumscribe 
the range, although I did not alter the plan of the work. To 
effect this I have studied to give one or more examples, some- 
times amounting to forty of each family, never losing sight of 
the Linnaean and Fabrician Genera, all of which, I believe, 
as far as native groups are concerned, have been illustrated, 
and also a very large portion of the Genera of other eminent 
authors, especially of Latreille, Olivier, Schonherr, Leach, 
Dejean, Gravenhorst, Kirby, Jurine, Hiibner, Treitschke, 
Germar, Fallen, Meigen, and most of the new and remark- 
able types that have been discovered during the last twenty 
years, those having been preferred which it seemed might 
prove most acceptable to men of science who were at the time 
engaged in their investigation. 
The assistance which the Entomologist has now at his com- 
mand, was not within his reach even when this work was 
commenced: long before that period a printed Catalogue 
of Insects was found to be so indispensable that one was 
compiled, a portion of w hich was printed at the expense of 
Mr. Wilkin, and this I should have completed many years 
before my “ Guide ” appeared, had not one been promised from 
another quarter. In the perusal of the British Entomology 
therefore, it is requested that it may be borne in mind, that 
at its commencement there w^ere no entomological periodicals 
nor any printed systematic Catalogues in circulation, which 
rendered it troublesome to communicate information and 
very difficult without an extensive library to ascertain species, 
as there was no regularity or harmony in nomenclature, and 
even in the boasted Cabinets of that time many of the largest 
families were “ rudis indigestaque moles.” One or two Fami- 
lies need only be here mentioned as examples : — the Diplole- 
pidae or Chalcididae, which I always admired for their beauty, 
were neither arranged nor named in any cabinet I had seen, 
