LINITEAN SOCIETY OF LOITOON. XXXUt 



but paying public ; and by judicious management some sacrifices to 

 popular tastes are far outweighed by tbe additional funds obtained 

 towards rendering their collections useful to science. 



The false data or errors to be guarded against in the observation, 

 of living zoological collections are chiefly owing to the unnatural 

 conditions in which the animals are placed. Ungenial climate, un- 

 accustomed food, want of exercise, &c. act upon their temper, habits, 

 and constitution ; and confinement materially modifies circumstances 

 connected with their propagation. Such errors or false data are no 

 doubt as yet very few and unimportant compared with those which 

 have arisen from the reliance on garden plants for botanical obser- 

 vations ; but as zoological gardens multiply and extend, they will 

 have to be more and more kept in view. 



In my younger days there were already a number of small collec- 

 tions of living animals, but almost all either travelling or local 

 menageries, exhibited for money by private individuals, or small 

 collections, kept up as a matter of curiosity for the benefit of the 

 public, such as those of the Pfauen Insel at Potsdam, the park at 

 Portici, or our own Tower menagerie. At Paris alone, at the Jardin 

 des Plantes, in the flourishing days of the Jussieus and Cuviers, was 

 the living zoological collection rendered essentially subservient to 

 the purposes of science. Since then, however, matters have much 

 changed. The Jardin des Plantes, which so long reigned supreme, 

 has, by remaining stationary, sunk into a second rank. She may, 

 indeed, be as justly as ever proud of her Milne-Edwards, her 

 Brongniart, her Decaisne, and many others ; but, long out of favour 

 Avith the government and the paying public, who transferred their 

 patronage to the high-sounding Jardin d'Acclimatation, now no 

 more, she has been almost abandoned to the resources of pure 

 science, always of the most restricted in a pecuniary point of view. 

 We, in the mean time, and, after our example, several Continental 

 states or cities, have made great advances. The formation of our 

 Zoological Society and Gardens opened a new era in the cultivation 

 of the science. After various vicissitudes, the Society had the good 

 fortune to secure the services of one who combined in the highest 

 degree zoological eminence with administrative ability ; and this, 

 our great living zoological collection, is now raised to the proud 

 relative position which the Jardin des Plantes once held, and which 

 there seems every reason to hope it will long maintain. With an 

 annual income of about ,£23,000, the Zoological Society is enabled 

 to maintain a living collection of about a thousand species of Verte- 

 brata; and although some portion of the surplus funds is neces- 



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