138 ORIGINxVL ARTICLES. 



Animals," because no available good one at present exists. Tlie 

 whole works of Aristotle were translated into English by Mr. 

 Thomas Taylor in 1812 ; but this work, which was executed for a 

 gentleman in London of the name of Mereditli, at whose expense it 

 was printed, is so rare that few persons have ever seen it even in 

 public libraries.* But the translation of the Natural History portion 

 in a scientific point of view is almost worthless ; a few instances 

 taken merely from the first chapter of the History of Animals will 

 suffice as a sample, — ralra Se. tU fxkv ulu ToJv fiopicjv lariv is ren- 

 dered, " but some of the parts are the same in species.''^ Again, \f yw 

 ?£ yivoQ o'lov opvida /cat lxdvy,is, rendered by this translator to express 

 the exact opposite to what Aristotle means : thus — " I speak of 

 those whose genus is the same as birds and fisliei' ! Although 

 it is perfectly true that Aristotle uses the term yivoQ in a very in- 

 definite sense, sometimes to denote a " class," sometimes a " genus," 

 and any division between the two, yet he would never have asserted 

 that a fish and a bird were to be comprehended in the same yivoQ. 

 In the passage in question, he intended to express the ytVog of bii-ds 

 as one division, and the yivog of fish as another. (§ 2.) Again, 

 avuirvtiv Kui tfCTTj'iO', " inspiration and expiration," is rendered " respi- 

 ration and expu'ation." The note to explain the word oXodovpia 

 conveys the following explicit piece of information, " a kind of 

 spongy and marine excrescence ;" the KapafooL are translated " locusts," 

 without a word of warning not to confuse the locusta {Palinurus 

 locusta ?) the Crustacean, with the Orthopterous insect of that name. 

 And to sum up may be added the following passage in ch. 5, § 4 — Tibv 

 Zi. Trrrjvwy ra jxtv nrepwrd kaTW, oloi' aeroc kcil lepa^' to. Se TrrtXwrct, oiov 

 HiXiTTU Kid iiriXoXovdrj' ra ^f ZtpfjiOTrrepa, o'lOV a.Xw7rr]L, Kal vvKrepic- 

 " But of birds some are winged, as the eagle and the hawk ; others 

 have a dry membrane for feathers, as bees and beetles ; and others 

 have leathern wings as the bird called alopex [or the flying fox] and 

 tlie bat." These specimens are sufficient to show that Taylor's trans- 

 lation cannot be regarded zoologically in any sense as expressing 

 the meaning of his author ; at the same time we have no intention 

 to pass any judgment at all on the whole work, but these instances 

 are cited in order to prove that a translator of a work on Natural 

 History should have some zoological knowledge. 



"With respect to other translations I am only able to speak of the 

 French one by M. Camus.f This seems to be a most creditable pro- 

 duction ; and the translator, who has taken infinite pains to get at the 

 meaning of his author, appears, as far as my slight knowledge of his 

 work goes, to have been successful. Perhajjs to the matter-of-fact 

 English mind, M. Camus occasionally leads one to fear he is giving us 



* I believe only 50 copies were printed ; a set was sold in London a few weeks 

 ago by Mr. Hodgson for £14. 14«. 



f Histoire des Animaux (TAridote, avec la Traduction Fraiigoine, par M. 

 Camus, A Paris, 1783. 



