REMARKS. 



the Spirit;, and, as far as practicable, to the very letter of my 

 author, have endeavoured to give to the whole work that 

 classical 'Mbrm and })ressure" which facilitates its study and 

 tends to fix its great and leading points more firmly in the 

 memory. How far I have succeeded others must determine. 



I have not forgotten that akhougli this work is more parti- 

 cularly intended to be studied by the naturalist, it will proba- 

 bly be 7'ead by every one who has the slightest desire to ac- 

 quire some knowledge of the numerous and interesting groups 

 of animals by which Man is surrounded, and with which he 

 is so indissolubly connected. The general reader will lose 

 nothing by the concise and simple style I have endeavoured to 

 adopt; and although the meanings of the names affixed to the 

 various divisions are not placed in glaring characters at their 

 head, he will always find it in the text. 



Whenever an animal is mentioned that is generally known 

 by one and the same English, or vulgar name, I have always 

 given it ; but of the many thousands here treated of, very few 

 are thus circumstanced, and I cannot but think that it would 

 be advantageous to the science if vulgar names were totally 

 excluded from its nomenclature. The evidence of this is to 

 be found in the fact, that, with comparatively few exceptions, 

 these names vary, not only in different countries, but in dif- 

 ferent parts of the same country. Thus the Rockfish of Phila- 

 delphia is a Striped-Bass at Boston ; the Sheephead of Pitts- 

 burg (a Corvina) is a totally different fish from the one so called 

 in our city (a Sargiis), and even belongs to a different family; 

 the Trout we receive from Long Branch might with equal 

 propriety be denominated a Shark or a Sturgeon. Different 

 names are sometimes attached to the same animal, and the 

 same name to different animals. Vulgar names are a fruitful 

 source of error ; and therefore I have employed them as spa- 

 ringly and as cautiously as possible. 



An immaculate book is perhaps rather to be wished for than 

 expected, and that errors should have crept into the Regne 

 Animal is not at all surprizing. These I have endeavoured 

 to correct, not by erasure or altering the text (those cases al- 



