The importance of insects may be gathered from another consideration.—Some of them are very useful. The bee we have already noticed. We may also mention the cochineal insect, which exists in great numbers in the East Indies and in South America. It is a minute creature, of the aphis tribe, one of which is hardly so large as a peppercorn. Yet it is produced in such quantities, that many thousands of pounds are sent every year, in a dried state, to America and Europe. They contain a coloring principle, called carmine, which produces an intensely red color. These insects are chiefly used for dying scarlet. In Brazil, large estates are devoted to the cultivation of plants, for the purpose of breeding them. Great quantities are also produced in different parts of Spain.
Among the useful insects, we may notice the Spanish fly, which is about three fourths of an inch in length, with brilliant green wings. These are shaken down from the trees, it being their habit to feign death when disturbed. They are called cantharides, and are used in medicine, especially for producing blisters.
We might notice many other useful insects, but must pass them by. We might speak, also, of the beautiful fireflies, which appear in myriads, during the night, over our meadows and amid the forests; of the glow-worms, which seem to burn with a mild and steady blaze, to illuminate the darkness; and the great lantern moth of South America, which is sometimes used to decorate the heads of females, and several of which will answer the purpose of a torch.
But we must pass over these wonderful things, and consider that the surface of the earth, the waves of the sea, and the very atmosphere around the whole globe, are all the abodes of countless insects. Even the stalks and leaves of plants are filled with them. If you will take a microscope and look into the stalks of certain plants, you will see thousands of little busy, bustling insects there, all of them seeming to be in the full enjoyment of existence. Nay, if you will apply the microscope to a tumbler of pure water, you will see that this also is filled with living things. Thus the poet says:
“Full nature swarms with life; one wondrous mass
Of animals, creatures organized.
Through subterranean cells,
Where searching sunbeams scarce can find a way,
Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf
Wants not its soft inhabitants. Secure,