MR VICE-CHANCELLOR AND GENTLEMEN OF THE 

 UNIVERSITY, 



MY first impulse in availing myself of the privilege of 

 addressing you in this place, is, to give expression to 

 the deep sense which I entertain of the honour conferred 

 on me by my appointment to ' Sir Robert Eeade's Lecture- 

 ship,' especially as it is the first which has been made since 

 the revival of that ancient foundation. Believe me, Sir, I truly 

 appreciate the favour of your choice, and am fully impressed 

 with the responsibilities which it involves. And if my ac- 

 knowledgments should seem curt or inadequate, I would be- 

 seech you to believe that this results from the wish not to tres- 

 pass too long on your most valuable time, but to devote to 

 the subject selected as much as may be of the period com- 

 monly allotted to an oral discourse. 



In reviewing, for the choice of this subject, the field of 

 Natural Science in which I am a labourer, I desired to 

 'select one that might be treated of with a certain degree 

 of completeness in a single Lecture, one that would enable 

 me to submit to you some of the more recent generalisa- 

 tions in Natural History, and at the same time exemplify 

 the applicability of that science, as a discipline, to the im- 

 provement of the intellect, and especially as a sharpener of the 

 faculties of observation and of methodical arrangement. 



I trust that in the attempt to briefly unfold the Classi- 

 fication and Geographical Distribution of the Mammalia I 

 may attain the end I have in view. 



The generalisation resulting in the idea of the natural 

 group of animals, so called, is one of ancient date.' The 

 ZOOTOKA of Aristotle included the same outwardly diverse but 

 organically similar beings which constitute the MAMMALIA 

 of modern Naturalists. In that truly extraordinary compen- 

 dium of zoological and zootomical knowledge, the l Tlepl 

 iaropias 1 ,' animals generally, and by implication the 



1 Ed. Schneider, Leipzig, iSn, 4 Vols. 8vo. 



B 



