exposition with scientific accuracy, noting the historical difficulty of scattered, obscure descriptions and the rise of field-based, economically useful entomology. It then outlines rules of classification and naming, comments on Australia’s distinctive, climate-shaped fauna and its affinities, and explains insect structure, metamorphosis, respiration, and senses, followed by a brief review of the sparse local fossil record. The systematic accounts begin with Aptera (springtails and silverfish), then Orthoptera, covering earwigs and cockroaches, and giving an extended, illustrated treatment of termites—their castes, royal chamber, mound forms (including “magnetic” north–south mounds), and key genera. Brief sections introduce web-spinners newly recorded from Australia, book lice, and predatory mantids with their egg masses, before turning to phasmids with striking leaf- and stick-mimicry. The opening closes as it enters the short-horned grasshoppers (Acridiidae), describing their anatomy, oviposition, sound-making, and exemplifying the section with the yellow-winged locust. (This is an automatically generated summary.)