INTRODUCTION. g-y 



temis, and enlarging a synonymy wliich is already bur- 

 thensome and inconvenient. Some of the most dis- 

 tinguished European concliyliologists are obnoxious to 

 the charge of forgetting these wholesome rules, and 

 not only of neglecting the rights of American naturalists, 

 but of taking from them, and transferring to others, the 

 little credit they might derive from a just appreciation of 

 their efforts. To show that tliis assertion is not without 

 foundation, and that the labors of our naturalists in this 

 department have been so frequently overlooked as to 

 indicate a design to neglect them, or an indifference to 

 their rights, and then to prove that there is good reason. 

 for complaint, it will be sufficient to review the species 

 of Helix which were first described by ]\Ir. Say, and 

 which were published by him antecedent to the appear- 

 ance of the works of jMM. Lamarck and Fdrussac. Mr. 

 Say published, in the Journal of the Academy of Phila- 

 delphia, previously to, and in the month of, January, 



1821, descriptions of twenty-three well-ascertained spe- 

 cies. In 1822, M. Ferussac published his Tableau Sys- 

 tematique de la Famille des Limacons, in which he indi- 

 cated by name only, without descriptions or figures, 

 seventeen of the same species ; of these, ten appeared 

 under Mr. Say's names, two under new names ascribed 

 to M. Rafinesque, and five were assumed by M. Ferus- 

 sac himself, and his own names appended. In April, 



1822, appeared the second part of the sixth volume of 

 the Ayiimaux sans Vertebres of M. Lamarck. This 

 work was, in point of fact, published before the above- 



VOL. I. 7 



