For him whose tastes incline to the study of animated nature, no pursuit is better adapted than that of entomology, by which I mean practical entomology. Without attempting for one moment to deery the labours of the systematic entomologist, whose discriminating eye enables him to discover trailing points of difference marking out species, and by whose aid we are enabled to affix a certain name and position to that insect, which to the inhabitant of another country would be unrecognisable in our description, yet he who would see the full beauty of insect life, must live among insects, and with them. Here lies the superiority of this peculiar branch of natural history. Lions, tigers, elephants, giraffes, in dens, as we see them at the zoological gardens, give us very little idea of what their demeanour would be in their native forests. Who could (unless he were a German) write a natural history of the hippopotamus from examination of the mild, afectionate, oily monster who waddles after his keeper, and would not hear of going to sleep unless his human companion slept by his side? Or who will say that the much enduring lions, or the slouching, lazy Polar bears, give much idea of the manners of those animals in their native haunts, where the lion stalks fearlessly, and with that majesty of department which want of fear always gives, or springs like a thunderbolt on his prey, dashing the enormous giraffe to the ground; or where, amid everlasting ice and snow, the Polar bear glides through the water in chase of the seal, or from the ice cliff defies the armed men who approach? Animals to be studied properly must be studied in their natural states, and if the observer cannot go to them, he must bring them to him. This he cannot do with the larger animals, but he can with the insects. The space which would not suffice for a lion to turn in, will form a forest for a beetle, and any one who has a room to give up to insects, and a hand to execute, can draw round him colonies of almost every order of insect, exhibiting their instets and habits, as perfectly as if they had been left in the fields. He must have a hand to execute, because, when he comes to the practical part of the business, he will find, that in order to make the artificial forest, brook, or earth, as like the original as possible in all its properties, some amount of handwork is required, and if, like Davy's experimental philosopher, he cannot saw a plank with a gimlet, or bore a hole with a saw, woe be to his purse. With, however, some ingenuity in resource and workmanship, the study of insects may be pursued with scarcely any detriment to the pocket, and any one possessing a room, or what is still more valuable, a room and a yard, or the roof of a house, may make a magic circle within which he may gather an incredible amount of insects, some by bringing them from their native haunts, and others, by laying such irresistible inducements for them, that they come of their own accord. He may rear most valuable moths and butterfliesfrom the egg, and secure a large brood for the next year he may keep a colony of those queer mole-crickets which' show such sport if poked at with a straw; he may transplant an entire nest of ant, wasp, or hornet, without the possibility of getting stung; or at all events, he may, at a trifling expense, set up a few hives of another of the same order, of the common hive bee. These will, in fact, cost nothing; as, if the management be only passable, the produce of the hives will pay their cost in the first year, and all after that will be sheer gain. If, however, after long trial, the hives fail, let him not be discouraged, but try again, leaving no method untried to discover the cause of the former failures. There are few places where bees cannot find a subsistence. Even in the heart of large cities, men keep colonies of bees, who, although their honey is not always of the finest flavour, yet thrive very tolerably in their domiciles on the house-top or the garret window-sill. All who are acquainted with the usages of college society, would agree that a more unpropitious locality for a bee-hive could scarcely be found than in a college window, for bees have a peculiar objection to tobacco smoke, which seldom ceases to exist within the college walls, not to mention the pranks that would be played by the more juvenile members upon the unfortunate bees through the medium of a long pipe. Moreover, bees dislike loud and sudden noises. This taste of theirs is not likely to be gratified by the learners of the comet-a-piston, post-horn, and other brazen instruments, which are usually played without intermission for several hours daily (like the court of the Flying Island, and with the same disregard for time), and subjected to occasional flourishes at any hour of the day or night. Then bees do not like strangers, of whom they must see plenty, if they reside in a college. Yet a colony of bees was kept, and successfully kept, in one of the colleges at Oxford. Their master is now a well-known aiparian, whose works on bee management have met with a well deserved reputation. For several years after he left college, the bee-stands and entrance-boards might be seen in the window, serving to remind the passer-by, that one man at least existed in the college, whose mind did not deem the study of insect life too trifling for the intellect of a human being. So let not the reader be deterred from the purchase of lives by the apparent unsuitableness of the locality. I am persuaded that if a strong stock were placed in the ball of St. Paul's Cathedral, they would get their living. For it is known that bees can fly three miles' distance in search of food, and bare would be the place indeed, where, within a circle of eighteen miles' circumference, a hive could not find food enough for its preservation. Even if they cannot do so, and supposing that they are kept more for the purpose of experiment and observation than for profit, they can be fed with sugar and beer, and will contrive to get both honey and wax out of it. Nor let those fear whose very natural dread of stings has hitherto repelled them from the apparently dangerous pursuit of bee-keeping. It is perfectly possible so to arrange the live, that while the observer can at his pleasure examine any part of the edifice, no bee can possibly reach him, unless the bee's sting is capable of penetrating through a barrier of wood and glass. The trouble, too, of keeping these most wonderful little insects is not nearly so great as is generally imagined. Only give them a fair start, and the less they are meddled with, the better for the bees. Put a good strong stock into the hive to begin with, and there will be little necessity to do anything with them except to take off well-glasses full of the finest wax and honey, and to substitute empty glasses ; no very laborious task. Dees, like most other corporate bodies, have a great horror of interference from without, and always like to work their own reforms without the assistance of commissions from other quarters, and think that their own sovereign is quite capable of governing them without seeking the help of other powers. So the bee-master cannot meddle too little with the bees, and he must be a most particularly somnolent individual who would find the labour of attending to a few hives too much for him.