INTRODUCTION. 67 
have perished from the severity of the climate, give 
but little room to expect any duplicate will ever be 
obtained during the present age ; and the learned 
quotations that have been taken from it by those 
celebrated authors Linneeus and Fabricius in all 
their late editions, are incontestable proofs of the 
high degrees of estimation they entertained of it." 
The work, which embodied many of the rarities of 
this collection, * derived its principal value from the 
plates, which are greatly superior to any thing of 
the same kind that had previously appeared in this 
country; the descriptions are of little value, and 
intended, as Drury himself states, merely to assist 
the reader in observing the figures ; but the locali- 
ties are indicated with some care, and the trivial 
names of Linnaeus to a certain extent applied, being 
the first attempt of the kind made in this country. 
The original deficiencies of the text, however, are 
now amply made up, and a high degree of value 
imparted to the work, even in the present state of 
the science, in a beautiful edition published three 
years ago under the editorial superintendence of 
Mr. AVestwood, who has added much additional 
matter, and given, wherever practicable, an account 
of the different states of the species, in which the 
original Avork was wholly defective, not a single 
lepidopterous larva being either figured or described. 
This w'ork, therefore, has on two separate occasions 
been of important service to the history of the noc- 
* The collection was ultimately brought to the hammer and 
dispersed (May 23, 1805), realising the sum of £614 8s. 6d. 
