1832-35-] PRODROME DES ECHINODERMES. 61 



drawing. It succeeded better than any other publica- 

 tion in showing that the cretaceous strata of Neuchatel 

 were a special formation, differing from the Green 

 Sand and Gault of England, and, at the same time, 

 younger than the Portland stone of the Jurassic sys- 

 tem. At that time, the name Neocomian, to designate 

 the Neuchatel strata of the Lower Cretaceous had not 

 yet been used by Thurmann, who offered it at a meet- 

 ing of Jurassian geologists at Besangon, in September, 



1835. 

 The " Prodrome d'une monographic des Radiaires ou 



Echinodermes," read also before the Neuchatel Society 

 on the loth of January, 1834, was published in 1835, a t 

 page 1 68 of the first volume of the memoirs of that 

 society ; it is the starting-point of all the publications 

 on the echinoderms, according to the principles of 

 classification of Cuvier. Agassiz followed the method 

 of his master ; and in the first twelve pages he gives a 

 most remarkable exposition of their zoological charac- 

 ters, and of his views on the classification and deter- 

 mination of the genera of that class of marine animals. 

 Curiously enough, a year and a half later, in August, 1835, 

 Charles Des Moulins, an able zoologist of Bordeaux, 

 without any knowledge of the works of Agassiz, pub- 



t 



lished his "Etudes sur les Echinides," in three papers; 

 Bordeaux, 1835-1837. The first two, published in August 

 and December, 1835, contain no reference to Agassiz's 

 researches; but the third paper, dated September, 1837, 

 contests the priority of some of the genera created by 

 Agassiz. As a whole, the two memoirs by Agassiz and 



