food both to birds and fish, on which we ourselves partly subsist, and that to three of their tribes we owe much-to the silk-worm, our beautiful silks; our honey and wax to the bee; and that beautiful scarlet die which distinguishes the coats of our soldiers all over the world, to the cochineal.

Insects, properly so called, have six or eight legs; the head and throat divided; two long feelers, called antennæ, projecting like little horns from the head; and air tubes for breathing.

Insects are unlike other animals in one very remarkable respect. They undergo changes so complete as to make them totally different animals at different parts of their life. The same little creature, which at one period of its life is fitted only to inhabit a stagnant pool, at another is a winged inhabitant of air: this is the case with the gnat. Some insects undergo two of these transformations-some three.

First comes from the egg, the caterpillar, grub, or worm, for people give them different names. This is properly called the larva. When this caterpillar has lived its appointed time, it turns into a shapeless grub, which is called the pupa, or chrysalis. This chrysalis is usually found buried in the earth, or under the root of a tree, or lodged in some obscure corner, wrapped up in a cocoon of silk, or some other substance, whence in due time bursts forth the perfect animal-a fly, or beetle, or moth, or beautiful butterfly.

The instinct of the caterpillar in spinning for itself this shroud, or cocoon, before it changes into the pupa, is very remarkable. When it has completely enveloped itself, it suspends its cocoon by a single thread to the branch of a tree. All the silk we possess is woven from the silk which one species of caterpillar, called the silk-worm, spins for herself. One cocoon, it is said, will yield 300

yards of silk thread. The caterpillar which spins it, lives chiefly on mulberry leaves.

Flies, gnats, bees, and wasps, and many other insects, have only two changes.

The instinct of bees, especially in their care of the grub, or pupa, is very remarkable. You will read of it in another place.

Spiders.-There are some classes of animals which we are accustomed to call insects, but which do not undergo these curious changes, and to which other names are given. Such are spiders, and those creatures which resemble them. Spiders show remarkable instinct in the management of the webs which they spread to catch their prey. The spider draws the threads of her web from her own body. If a single thread is touched by any insect, she feels it vibrate, and runs out of her hidingplace to seize her victim; if it prove too strong for her, she quietly lets herself down again by her thread. Some spiders wrap up their prey in the web, so as to master it more easily. The house spider, who spreads her web in some neglected corner of a room, makes also a little cell, which she connects with the web by a bridge, and to this cell she conveys, across her bridge, the unfortunate fly or gnat who has become entangled in her snare.

There is a spider in South America which is as big as a pigeon's egg. The little mite which inhabits decayed cheese belongs also to this class of animals. So does the scorpion, which is found in the warmer parts of Europe, and whose bite is very painful.

Crustacea. The crustacea are animals with hard or crusty coverings like egg-shell, but harder. Crabs, lobsters, and shrimps, are crustacea, and are wholesome food.

Mollusca.-Those animals with soft bodies, which are usually found in shells, but sometimes covered over with a leathery kind of cloak, are called mollusca. Their shells are often most beautiful in colour and form. Oysters belong to this class of animals; and some species contain the pearls which are so much prized as ornaments. Most of these animals are found in the sea, or attached to rocks washed by the sea, or in fresh water lakes. But some of them live on land, as the snails, and the slugs, so destructive to our gardens.

Worms.-Worms are cold-blooded, and naked in appearance, and seem to belong to the reptiles; but they are lower animals, they have neither head nor legs; neither do they resemble insects. The leech is one of this class.

Radiata.-We now come to a class of animals, some of which are shaped like a star; others resemble vegetables so much that they have been called animal plants, or zoophytes. So that in coming to the end of the animal kingdom, we meet with animal natures approaching in appearance very near to the vegetables which preceded them.

It wins my admiration

To view the structure of that little work-
A bird's nest. Mark it well within, without:
No tool had he that wrought; no knife to cut;
No nail to fix; no bodkin to insert;

No glue to join; his little beak was all;
And yet how nicely finish'd! What nice hand,
With every implement and means of art,
And twenty years' apprenticeship to boot,
Could make me such another?

HURDIS.

The sounds and seas, each creek and bay,
With fry innumerable swarm, and shoals
Of fish that, with their fins and shining scales,
Glide under the green wave, in sculls that oft
Bank the mid sea: part, single or with mate
Graze the sea-weed, their pasture, and thro' groves
Of coral stray, or sporting with quick glance
Show to the sun their waved coats dropt with gold,
Or, in their pearly shells at ease, attend

Moist nourishment, or under rocks their food
In jointed armour watch; part, huge of bulk,
Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait,
Tempest the ocean.

STRUCTURE OF INSECTS.

MILTON.

'Tis sweet to muse upon His skill displayed,
(Infinite skill), in all that He has made!
To trace in Nature's most minute design
The signature and stamp of power divine;
Contrivance intricate, expressed with ease,
Where unassisted sight no beauty sees;
The shapely limb, and lubricated joint,
Within the small dimensions of a point,
Muscle and nerve miraculously spun,
His mighty work, who speaks and it is done;
The Invisible, in things scarce seen revealed,
To whom an atom is an ample field;

To wonder at a thousand insect forms,
These hatched, and those resuscitated worms,
New life ordained, and brighter scenes to share,
Once prone on earth, new buoyant upon air;
Whose shape would make them, had they bulk and
More hideous foes than fancy can devise; [size,
With helmet-heads, and dragon scales adorned,
The mighty myriads, now securely scorned,
Would mock the majesty of man's high birth,
Despise his bulwarks, and unpeople earth.

COWPER.

LESSON XIII.

GOD, THE AUTHOR OF NATURE.

THERE lives and works

A soul in all things, and that soul is God.
The beauties of the wilderness are His,
That make so gay the solitary place
Where no eye sees them. And the fairer forms
That cultivation glories in are His.

He sets the bright procession on its way,

And marshals all the order of the year;

He marks the bounds which winter may not pass,
And blunts its pointed fury; in its case,
Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ,
Uninjured, with inimitable art;

And, ere one flowery season fades and dies,
Designs the blooming wonders of the next.
The Lord of all, Himself through all diffused,
Sustains, and is the life of all that lives.
Nature is but a name for an effect

Whose cause is God. One spirit-His

Who wore the plaited thorns with bleeding brows,
Rules universal Nature! Not a flower

But shows some touch, in freckle, streak, or stain,
Of His unrivalled pencil. He inspires
Their balmy odours, and imparts their hues,
And bathes their eyes with nectar, and includes,
In grains as countless as the sea-side sands,
The forms with which He sprinkles all the earth.
Happy who walks with Him! whom, what he finds,
Of flavour, or of scent, in fruit, or flower,
Or what he views of beautiful or grand
In Nature, from the broad majestic oak
To the green blade that twinkles in the sun,
Prompts with remembrance of a present God!

COWPER.