116 ON THE niYSTOGNOMY OF SERPENTS. 



his genera Naja, Boa, and Constrictor ; on the other hand, 

 it is only necessary to examine his genera Natrix, Cerastes, 

 and others, to be con\dnced of the little certainty wliich 

 pervades his ^news relative to the cliaracters which he as- 

 signs to distinguish his artificial divisions. 



The order of Serpents, as it exists in the edition of the 

 Systema Naturce publislied by Gmelin,* differs not from 

 that of his original author, but in the addition of species 

 described by naturalists and travellers to that period. 



It was almost at the same time, that the work of Dau~ 

 BENTONf on Reptiles appeared in the form of a dictionary ; 

 a book now rarely consulted, although it is the basis of 

 those of Lacepede and Bonnaterre.J 



In the gi'cat work of Count Lacepede, the Serpents com- 

 pose a fourth order of the class of Reptiles, distinct from 

 tlie three first, which f(^rm those of Oviparous Quadrupeds 

 with a tail, witliout the tail, and the Oviparous Bipeds. In 

 adopting the six genera of serpents devised by Linnaeus, 

 the continuator of Buffon added the Langaha and the 

 Acrochordus, after the descriptions of Bruguieres and of 

 Hornstedt ; for it was not until fifteen years afterwards 

 thatthegenera Erpeton, Leioselasma, Disteira, andTrimere- 

 surus, were established. The work recommends itself by the 

 beauty of the style, which is poetic in some parts, although 

 the statements which make the basis of the reasonings are 

 not always in accordance with fact ; the descriptions, more 

 lengthened than those of his predecessors, rarely sin against 

 minuteness, but they are far from sufficing for a rigorous 

 determination of species. The figures which serve to illus- 

 trate this work are scarcely above mediocrity, and are some- 

 times even very bad. 



It was not more than ten years after the publication of 

 the Natural History of Reptiles of Lacepede, that a Ger- 

 man translation of it appeared from the pen of the cele- 



* Linn. Syst. Naturce, Ed. 13. Gmel. Lips. 1788. 

 t It forms a part of the Encyclopedic Methodique, of which the first vo- 

 lume appeared in 1782. 



J Encycop. Med. Paris, 1802. 



