LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. Xcix 
from the first have acquired a taste for zoological studies, for the 
pursuit of which he was placed in such advantageous circumstances 
and guided by such an able instructor. 
Nor was he backward in taking advantage of his position. His 
first contribution to science was made in his nineteenth year, when 
he published the description of an American Bat (Nyctinomus brasi- 
lensis) ; and at twenty-one he furnished the ‘ Dictionnaire Classique 
d’Histoire Naturelle’ with an article, afterwards published in a 
separate form under the title of ‘ Considérations générales sur la 
Classe des Mammiféres ’—a work in which he thus early manifested 
the strong tendency of his mind to the generalization of facts, which 
he had doubtless acquired from his father’s precepts and example. 
From this time his contributions to science were numerous and 
varied ; but it is unnecessary, perhaps, to notice any in particular, 
until we come to his first more important work, entitled ‘ Histoire 
générale et particuliére des Anomalies de l’Organisation chez]’Homme 
et les Animaux; ou, Traité de Tératologie,’ in three volumes, the 
first of which was published in 1832, and the last in 1836. The 
publication of this work, which may be regarded as an amplification 
and extended demonstration of the views respecting monstrosities 
entertained and already expressed by his father, led to the author’s 
election, at the early age of twenty-seven, into the Academy, where 
he succeeded to the vacant seat of Latreille, in the section of 
Zoology, on the 15th April, 1833. 
Previously to this, however, that is to say, in 1829, Isidore Geof- 
froy, then only twenty-four, had already commenced his career as a 
teacher, acting at first as an aid to his father, and selecting Ornitho- 
logy as the subject of his lectures. In the following year he also 
delivered an interesting course of lectures at the “‘ Athénée,” having 
for their- subject the fundamental relations of the species of animals 
inter se and towards the external world. In 1837 he was appointed 
his father’s deputy at the Faculty of Sciences of Paris, a provisional 
chair which he shortly afterwards quitted to proceed to Bordeaux, 
where, under the title of “ Dean,” he undertook the organization of 
the Faculty of Sciences established in that city in 1838. Having 
fulfilled this mission, he returned to Paris, and was named Inspector 
of the Academy ; and he also discharged the functions of Inspector- 
General of the University in 1840, although the title itself does not 
appear to have been actually bestowed upon him before 1844, These 
offices he continued to occupy until he succeeded M. de Blainville in 
the Zoological chair at the Faculty of Sciences in 1850. In addition, 
however, to the responsible duties of his inspectorial office, he had 
