There is nothing more beautiful, wonderful and interesting than insect life; there is nothing that offers a wider field for examination or affords more gratifying results. Under the head of insects are classed, in popular language, all the minute animals; but only those having six legs and two antennæ, and which undergo one or more changes or metamorphoses should be included; most of them have wings, and their name is derived from the word _insecta_, divided, which is applied to the divisions or articulations of their bodies. The outer part of their body is slightly bony, and to it the muscles are attached.
Insects exist in myriads; whole families are still undescribed, and many species unknown. Even in the old countries new discoveries are made yearly, and in the New World it can hardly be said that anything is authenticated on the subject. Facts concerning the commonest are most remarkable. One class of white ants, like our southern fellow countrymen, makes slaves of a darker race. Many beautiful flies live only a few hours. The eyes of the common house fly are composed of numerous surfaces or lenses, and their life, habits and instincts are a study in themselves. Being so numerous and so nearly allied, their classification is entirely imperfect, and like a similar attempt with any other part of animal life, a failure. Almost every scientific writer has invented a system of entomological distribution for himself, and their united efforts have produced endless confusion; the arrangement generally followed is that of Latreille, the father of modern entomology.
Insects are by him divided into two great divisions: those that live by chewing, _mandibulata_, and those that live by sucking, _haustellata_, whence the name applied to some of the human family. Of the former the beetles, _coleoptera_, are prominent, and among the latter the butterflies, _lepidoptera_. It is to be observed that the bees, although furnished with a sucking apparatus to collect honey, feed with mandibles, and are in the first class.
Latreille further divides the various groups as follows; and although English authors have made many changes, the alterations are of such doubtful utility that the original classification will be retained.