certain French Naturalists, 317 



particulars of its discovery; to conceal from them names, 

 dates, and circumstances ; they have both, as I am now in- 

 formed by Mr. Bennett, actually referred to the volume and 

 page where all these particulars are given ! No man who 

 wishes to tell a falsehood, and to have that falsehood believed 

 by others, will be so inconceivably silly as to refer to a book, 

 or cite as an authority, a statement which would completely 

 belie his words. Nay more, it now appears that M. Lesson, 

 not content with quoting M. Cuvier's work, goes still farther : 

 he refers to a passage of Sir Stamford Raffles's paper, where 

 the true history of the discovery is again given ! Now, had 

 M. Lesson's motives been dishonourable, he could not have 

 chosen a more certain method of exposing his own duplicity. 

 Why, therefore, Mr. Bennett should construe this latter act 

 of justice into a jealousy of Major Farquhar's name, is to me 

 perfectly unaccountable. 



Truth is generally the result of discussion ; and, however I 

 regret being drawn into a controversy vath Mr. Bennett in de- 

 fence of an absent friend, I cannot but feel pleasure that I am 

 now enabled to place the motives of MM. Desmarest and Les- 

 son beyond suspicion. Mr. Bennett himself must now acquit 

 them of wilfully intending to mislead their readers. The 

 weight and importance of his charges have not, I think, been 

 increased. I wish it to be observed that I do not possess any 

 of those works to which Mr. Bennett alludes ; they are all 

 out of my line of study. I have therefore taken his own 

 authority ; the best, perhaps, that could be brought forward 

 on this occasion. 



Mr. Bennett regrets "that, in the discharge of an unpleasant 

 duty, he was compelled " to speak of MM. Desmarest and 

 Lesson in such terms. Let me ask him, what was this " duty?" 

 and in what manner was he " compelled?" Pursuant to the 

 plan of his work, he had to describe one animal, the American 

 Tapir : what occasion was there to wander from that subject, 

 to travel to Asia, and introduce a controversy about a totally 

 different animal, the Tapir of Sumatra ? Why seek occa- 

 sion to follow up, under a new form, the attack made upon 

 M. Lesson by his colleague in office only a few months be- 

 fore ? Assuredly this was neither a " duty "' nor was it com- 

 pulsory. 



Mr. Bennett will surely perceive that the charge of accusing 

 the French naturalists collectively is not applied to him. It 

 is urged against the writer who states that M. Desmarest 

 makes " a national rather than a personal attack " upon British 

 naturalists ; and who has unequivocally declared that " there 

 prevails, to a great extent, a disposition to depreciate the 



