2.0-L THE HISTORY OF BIOLOGY 



partly aquatic animals — whales). Land animals are also characterized by 

 their hairy covering, as the result of which the manatee, which lives in the 

 water, can be included among them. The bloodless animals are divided into 

 small (the insects) and large (molluscs, crayfish, crustaceans). In examining 

 this system we may pass over the ' ' bloodless ' ' animals, of which Ray himself 

 only studied the insects; aquatic animals were, on the whole, of no interest 

 to him, and as, moreover, Willughby had devoted himself to birds and fishes, 

 there remained only the quadrupeds, which, as mentioned above, formed 

 the subject of his principal zoological work. The hairy quadrupeds are di- 

 vided into Ungulata or hoofed animals, and Unguiculata or clawed animals. 

 Among the former are reckoned one-hoofed (equine), pair-hoofed (Rumi- 

 nantia and swine), and multi-hoofed (rhinoceros and hippopotamus). 

 Amongst the Unguiculata are included pair-clawed (the camel) and multi- 

 clawed; (i) with claws grown together (the elephant); (x) with separate 

 claws, of which there are: flat claws (apes) and narrow claws (carnivorous 

 animals and Rodentia). Moreover, a number of mammals are classified as 

 "anomalous" — namely, the hedgehog, the molcj the shrew-mouse, the 

 armadillo, the sloth, and the bat. The oviparous quadrupeds are finally 

 divided into frogs (including tortoises), lizards, and snakes. In this system 

 each genus is then characterized with a diagnosis — for instance, the genus 

 Ovis, the genus Martes — and the species of the genera are likewise given 

 each a separate diagnosis. On the other hand, the genera of frogs, lizards, 

 and snakes are not diagnosed, only a common characteristic being named, 

 followed by diagnosis of the species. 



To measure Ray's work as a systematician by modern standards would 

 naturally be entirely unhistorical, but his system can by no means bear com- 

 parison even with that of Linnasus. And yet for his age it constitutes an 

 extraordinary advance, primarily in that he clearly realized the difference 

 between species and genus, secondly on account of his possessing what was 

 undeniably — in comparison with his predecessors — an extremely keen eye 

 for the similarities on which the assumption of affinity in its wider sense 

 may be based; several of his larger groups, both in the vegetable and in the 

 animal kingdom, are "natural" in the best sense of the word. In the sphere 

 of botany, also, the difference discovered by him between mono- and dicoty- 

 ledons is of essential importance. On the other hand, several of the sub- 

 divisions which he formed are highly artificial, as will be clearly seen from 

 a glance at his division of mammals, according to claws and nails. And in 

 any case he established no common systematic categories to cover all living 

 creatures. The one who by doing so paved the way for a completely uniform 

 conception of life-form on this earth was Linnasus, the founder of modern 

 plant and animal classification. 



