The Life of an Insect

wish to direct attention. Had not notice been thus directed to it, in all probability we should have passed it by, if we observed it at all, only considering it to be a broken tw

thing to attract-it is of a dirty white or brown, and in shape it is, though curious, so small, and so uninviting, that few would take the trou

e lapse of a little time will convert the slumbering being, thus singularly hung up to be the sport of the wind and rain, into a creature more extraordinarily active than perhaps any other in the animal creation. While

pposed there remained little to be said upon a period of the insect's life which is only comparable to a prolonged sleep. But entomological science is too rich in interesting matters upon every subject to admi

ve perhaps only seen babies as they are clothed in England, possessing the power and comfort of free movement, and having their arms and legs at liberty. Between the aspect of these little creatures and our insects no one can trace any resemblance. But it is very different on the continent; there, out of the strange notion that it will keep the poor little being's limbs straight, it is the custom to wrap babies up in swaddling clothes, until they can neither sti

Pu

of a golden lustre, the one being derived from the Latin, the other from the Greek term for "gold," and this even when they are not gilded in this manner. Again, when, as we shall presently have to notice, the insect in the pupa state is still capable of eating or moving, or when it does not lose its

and more perfect creature out of one which, however perfectly adapted to its condition, is very far inferior, as regards the completion of its organization, to that which it is destined to become; and here we may appropriately pause to take up the history of the curious larva so recently described, at p. 207, as performing th

fat pig, or a leg of mutton-run races in sacks which are tied close about their necks, and of course tumble about a good deal, and display anything but a graceful mode of progression. "Now," say these authors, "take one of the most active and adroit of these, bind him hand and foot, suspend him by the bottom of his sack, with his head downwards, to the branch of a lofty tree; make an

rom the first rupture of the skin

gnified to show t

r while it climbs up to take its place? Without arms or legs to support itself, the anxious spectator expects to see it fall to the earth. His fears, however, are groundless; the supple segments of the pupa's abdomen serve in the place of arms. Between two of these, as with a pair of pincers, it seizes on a portion of the skin; and, bending its body once more, entirely extricates its tail from it. It is now wholly out of the skin, against one side of which it is supported, but yet at some distance from the leaf; the next step it must take is, to climb up to the required height. For this purpose it repeats the same ingenious man?uvre: making its cast skin serve as a sort of ladder, it successively, with its different segments, seizes a higher and a higher portion, until in the end it reaches the summit, where with its tail it feels for the silken threads that are to support it. The tail is provided with a number of minute hooks which catch in the meshes of the silken button, and the pupa, thrusting it into the meshes of this button, feels quite secure as to the result, and drops safely into the perpendicular position, dangling in the air as gaily as did the larva before it. But its old skin still clings to it, and seems greatly to annoy it by its presence; so

all the privacy and darkness of their solitary habitations; but in all probability it differs in no respect from the manner in which the sa

ells us with surprise of the larva of a moth which he had watched. It became a larva, and spun its cocoon, in the month of August, 1746, and was attentively kept during the winter. The spring came, but the larva still remained a larva, and did not show any signs of changing its form; and w