INTRODUCTION. 57 
terms, and enlarging a synonymy which is already bur- 
thensonie and inconvenient. Some of the most dis- 
tinguished European conchyliologists 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 this 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 Mr. Say, and 
which were published by him antecedent to the appear- 
ance of the works of MM. Lamarck and Ferussac. 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. Fe'rus- 
sac himself, and his own names appended. In April, 
1822, appeared the second part of the sixth volume of 
the Animaux sans Vertebres of M. Lamarck. This 
work was, in point of fact, published before the above- 
VOL. I. • 16 
