8 Biographical Memoir of M. Daubenton, 



easy to apprehend all the relations ; that, never being restricted 

 to any system, he has bestowed an equal attention on all the 

 parts, and could never be tempted to neglect or disguise what 

 was not conformable to the rules which he had established. 



However natural this method must appear to persons who 

 only judge of it by mere good sense, it is far from being very 

 easy to follow, since it is so rare to be met with in the works of 

 other naturalists, and there are so few among them who have 

 been at the trouble of placing the beings which they describe, 

 otherwise than as they are in their systems. 



Daubenton's work may be considered as a rich mine, in which 

 the naturalists and anatomists who engage in the examination of 

 quadrupeds are obliged to dig, and from which several writers 

 have extracted many precious articles, without acknowledgment. 

 It is sometimes only necessary to make a table of his observa- 

 tions, and to place them in certain columns, in order to obtain 

 the most striking results ; and it is thus that we ought to under- 

 stand Camper''s expression, that Daubenton did not knoiv all the 

 discoveries of which he was the author. 



He has been reproached with not having traced the table of 

 these results himself. It was with good reason, however, that 

 he avoided an operation which might have flattered his self-love, 

 but which would have led him into errors. Nature had been seen 

 by him to exhibit too many exceptions, to allow him to imagine 

 he could establish an order in her evolutions ; and his prudence 

 has been justified, not only by the ill success of those who have 

 been more adventurous than himself, but even by his own exam- 

 ple ; the only rule which he ventured to trace, namely, that sup- 

 posed to determine the number of the cervical vertebrae, having 

 been found, toward the end of his career, to be incorrect *. 



He has been also blamed for having confined his dissections 

 within too narrow bounds, having limited them to the descrip- 

 tion of the skeleton and viscera, without treating of the muscles, 

 vessels, nerves, or external organs of sense ; but it cannot be 

 proved that it was possible for him to have avoided this re- 

 proach, until one has done better in the same time, and with 

 the same means. It is certain, at least, that one of his pupils, 



^ "^rJiere are in general seven : the three-toed sloths, however, have niije. 



