28 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



author, and has also a fish, the name and distinctive characteristics 

 of which he is desirous of knowing. If there had been no more 

 system in classification than is found in Pliny's writings, he would 

 have to read the volumes all over in course, until he came to a 

 description that tallied with the specimen in hand ; but by the aid 

 of the classification adopted, it will be a much less difficult task to 

 find its name and description here. 



In the first place, he will look to its skeleton or frame, and ascer- 

 tain whether it be cartilaginous or bony. He finds it bony — it 

 therefore belongs to the osseoils class. The ascertaining this fact 

 abridges his labor materially. He may pass over the pages de- 

 scribing cartilaginous fishes and confine himself to the description 

 of osseous fishes only. Again he will look over the gill coverings, 

 and observe the appearance of those organs. Suppose he finds 

 that it has an operculum and branchial membrane. On reference 

 to the arrangement it will be seen that it belongs to the sixth di- 

 vision. His examination will therefore be still more curtailed, it 

 being unnecessary to search for the description in any part of the 

 volume than that which treats of fishes belonging to the sixth di- 

 vision. Next, he will turn his attention to the fins, particularly to 

 the ventrals. It either has or has not any ventrals. If it has 

 none, it belongs to the apodal order of the sixth division, and the 

 further search will be directed to that part of the work treating of 

 such. If it has ventrals, the position of them will determine the 

 order — if they are placed before the pectoral fins it comes under 

 the order of jugulares — and will be found in the description of that 

 order, and so of the others. 



Remarks on the difference behveen Artificial and Natural Orders. 

 It may be asked, if such classifications answer the purpose of 

 convenient arrangement ? — if they aid the author in giving method 

 and system to his work ? — if they aid the student in his research 

 into the distinctive points of the subjects under examination ? 

 Why is it not sufficient ? — and why should it be stigmatized as 

 artificial? For the mere and single purpose of descriptive aid, it 

 is enough. It is called artificial, because nature has never been 

 guilty of grouping animals so diverse into the same order as these 

 arrangements do — a proof that they are not arranged according to 

 the natural order of things. We alluded to this fact while speak- 

 ing of the system adopted by Linneus, which brought into one of 



