1 843-44.] POISSONS FOSSILES. 217 



cism which it called forth, and to meet claims which 

 have now and then been put forward. 



Agassiz knew perfectly well that his classification was 

 artificial, and not based on all the natural principles, as 

 it should have been, and as Cuvier's was before him ; but 

 he wanted to make use of a great quantity of fragmen- 

 tary specimens, and even mere scales of fishes, which 

 were found in abundance, and which otherwise would 

 have been useless, and would have left a great gap in 

 his series of forms. He worked as much to prove the 

 succession of fishes in the different systems of strata, as 

 to obtain a knowledge of them zoologically, trying to 

 find laws which might be used in palaeontology to clas- 

 sify groups of strata by their fossil fishes. And he 

 succeeded admirably? notwithstanding the defect of his 

 empiric classification. 



As Dr. A. Giinther says : " We have no hesitation in 

 affirming that if Agassiz had had an opportunity of 

 acquiring a more extensive and intimate knowledge of 

 existing fishes before his energies were absorbed in the 

 study of fossil remains, he would himself have recog- 

 nized the artificial character of his classification. The 

 distinctions between Cycloid and Ctenoid scales, between 

 Placoid and Ganoid fishes, are vague, and can hardly be 

 maintained. So far as the living and post-Cretacean 

 forms are concerned, he abandoned the vantage-ground 

 gained by Cuvier ; and therefore his system could never 

 supersede that of his predecessor, and finally shared the 

 fate of every classification based on the modifications of 

 one organ only. But Agassiz has the merit of having 

 opened an immense new field of researches by his study 



