AN INTRODUCTION 



CLASSIFICATION OF ANIMALS 



CHAPTER I. 



ON CLASSIFICATION IN GENERAL. 



BY the classification of any series of objects, is meant the actual, 

 or ideal, arrangement together of those which are like and the 

 separation of those which are unlike ; the purpose of this 

 arrangement being to facilitate the operations of the mind in 

 clearly conceiving and retaining in the memory, the characters 

 of the objects in question. 



Thus, there may be as many classifications of any series of 

 natural, or of other, bodies, as they have properties or relations 

 to one another, or to other things ; or, again, as there are 

 modes in which they may be regarded by the mind : so that, 

 with respect to such classification as we are here concerned with, 

 it might be more proper to speak of a classification than of the 

 classification of the animal kingdom. 



The preparations in the galleries of the Museum of the Royal 

 College of Surgeons are arranged upon the basis laid down by 

 John Hunter, whose original collection was intended to illustrate 

 the modifications which the great physiological apparatuses 

 undergo in the animal series : the classification which he adopted 

 is a classification by organs, and, as such, it is admirably 

 adapted to the needs of the comparative physiologist. 



But the student of the geographical distribution of animals, 

 regarding animated creatures, not as diverse modifications of one 



