THE LETTERS OF RUSTICUS.

LONDON:

PRINTED BY EDWARD NEWMAN, 9, DEVONSHIRE STREET,

BISHOPSGATE STREET.

PRINTED FOR JOHN VAN VOORST, BOOKSELLER AND
PUBLISHER, No. 1, PATERNOSTER ROW.
M.DCCC.XLIX.

"To me be Nature's volume broad-display'd;

And to peruse its all-instructing page,
Or, haply catching inspiration thence,
Some easy passage, raptured, to translate,
My sole delight."-THOMSON.

ΤΟ

TO THE INDULGENT READER.

HE
papers now for the first time associ-
ated, were addressed, many years ago
in the form of letters, to the Editors of
the 'Magazine of Natural History,' of
the Entomological Magazine,' and the
Entomologist.'

For years past I have observed partial reprints of these letters published from time to time, with or without acknowledgment, sometimes tolerably correct, sometimes greatly altered and mutilated; and I have also observed that such partial reprints have been favourably mentioned both by those who produced and those who read them. These circumstances led me to consider the propriety of issuing the whole as a complete although fragmentary work. The copyright had long since passed into my hands, and I had only to deliberate on the chances of the success likely to attend the venture.

Having at length concluded on making the trial, a difficulty arose in finding an editor who would undertake to collect and arrange the papers. This was scarcely a printer's task; and yet, as I read and re-read letter after letter, I felt so carried back to the scenes of my boyhood, I seemed