16 ON THE ICHTHYOLOGICAL SYSTEM 



Everard Home, Tiedemann, Humboldt, and many others, 

 occur. 



Nor are iconographical illustrations passed over ; from 

 those singular pictures still remaining engraved and coloured 

 on the walls of ancient Egypt, to the most recent collections 

 of plates and drawings, such as the Plumierian, that of 

 Prince Jean-Maurice of Nassau, the Commersonian, the Bank- 

 sian, the Japanese encyclopaedia and paintings of fish, Dus- 

 sumier's Chinese drawings, the plates of Reynard, Don 

 Antonio Parra, Russel, Mocigno, &c. Thus .having digested 

 all the observations written or pictorial records could fur- 

 nish, we find him no less active and persevering in person- 

 ally examining the anatomy ' of many hundred species, with 

 a tact and minuteness peculiarly his own, and employing for 

 this purpose the immense stores preserved in the museum of 

 Paris, and the numerous collections of fish supplied to him 

 by the emulation and zeal of princes, naturalists, and col- 

 lectors, from every part of Europe, and from distant regions. 



Although the difficulties attending researches on sub- 

 aqueous animals had hitherto opposed the equal advance of 

 this branch of the natural sciences, it was evident, that when 

 a more continued investigation into the structure of fishes, 

 and a more extensive examination of their species, should 

 have dispelled the obscurity still hanging over ichthyology, 

 a new method of classification would speedily be sought, 

 more conformable to the advanced state of the other branches 

 of natural history. No one can have been more fully sen- 

 sible of the necessity of a new system than our author, for 

 long before the different attempts made for this purpose, by 

 several of the naturalists before mentioned, he had already 



1 We have had the honour repeatedly to witness the author in his 

 study, with the dissecting knife in his left and the pencil in his_ right 

 hand, laying open the parts required, and sketching in a manner so spi- 

 rited and bold, as to be only surpassed by its fidelity. C. H. S. 



