Category: Science - Biology

An Introduction to Entomology: Vol. 1 or Elements of the Natural History of the Insects

I cannot wonder that an active mind like yours should experience no small degree of tedium in a situation so far removed, as you represent your new residence to be, from "the busy hum of men." Nothing certainly can compensate for the want of agreeable society; but since your c...

Chapters

4. LETTER IV.

In the letter which I devoted to the defence of Entomology, I gave you reason to expect, more effectually to obviate the objection drawn from the supposed insignificance of inse...

10. LETTER IX.

My last letters contained, I must own, a most melancholy though not an overcharged picture of the injuries and devastation which man, in various ways, experiences through the in...

6. LETTER VI.

Having endeavoured to give you some idea of the mode in which insects establish and maintain their empire over man and his train of dependent animals, I shall next call your att...

12. LETTER XI.

Amongst the larger animals, every observer of nature has witnessed, with admiration, that love of their offspring which the beneficent Creator, with equal regard to the happines...

15. LETTER XIV.

In forming an estimate of the civilization and intellectual progress of a newly discovered people, we usually pay attention to their buildings, and other proofs of architectural...

16. LETTER XV.

The societies which thus combine their operations may be divided into two kinds: 1st, those of which the object is simply the conservation of the individuals composing them; and...

11. LETTER X.

My last letter was devoted to the indirect advantages which we derive from insects; in the present I shall enumerate those of a more _direct_ nature for which we are indebted to...

2. LETTER II.

In my last I gave you a general view of the science of Entomology, and endeavoured to prove to you that it possesses attractions and beauty sufficient to reward any student who...

14. LETTER XIII.

The _stratagems_ of insects in obtaining their food are now to engage our attention. I shall not dwell on those inartificial modes of surprising their prey, of which examples ma...

9. LETTER VIII.

I have not yet arrived at the end of my catalogue of noxious insects. I have introduced you, indeed, to those that annoy man in his own person, in his domestic animals, in the p...

5. LETTER V.

Having detailed to you the _direct_ injuries which we suffer from insects, I am now to call your attention to their _indirect_ attacks upon us, or the injury which they do our p...

13. LETTER XII.

Insects like other animals draw their _food_ from the vegetable and animal kingdoms; but a very slight survey will suffice to show that they enjoy a range over far more extensiv...

3. LETTER III.

Were a naturalist to announce to the world the discovery of an animal which for the first five years of its life existed in the form of a serpent; which then penetrating into th...

1. LETTER I.

I cannot wonder that an active mind like yours should experience no small degree of tedium in a situation so far removed, as you represent your new residence to be, from "the bu...

8. LETTER VII.

To look at a _locust_ in a cabinet of insects, you would not, at first sight, deem it capable of being the source of so much evil to mankind as stands on record against it. "Thi...

7. xxxii. 320; and also for August 1811; and Sir Joseph Banks in the

[345] Dr. Smith Barton's Letter in _Philos. Magaz._ xxii. 210. William Davy, Esq. American Consul of the Port of Hull, long resident in the United States, informed me that thoug...