yfj INTRODUCTION. 
of the object described, must be burthened by an ad- 
ditional clause establishing the identity of the person 
commemorated. 
Another evil, of a still more grave character, in- 
asmuch as it affects the reputation of those concern- 
ed, has resulted ; the motive of these friendly compli- 
ments has been questioned, and they have been sup- 
posed to arise more from a desire to gratify a certain 
small vanity than from any expectation of promoting 
thereby the advance of zoology. We do not ourselves 
coincide in this last opinion, because we know too 
well the honorable sentiments of some who have fallen 
into the practice which we condemn, to suppose that 
they are actuated by motives so unworthy. "We be- 
lieve, on the contrary, that they have adopted it from 
an amiable wish to gratify their friends, without hav- 
ing sufficiently reflected upon the abuses of which it is 
susceptible, or upon the serious objections to which it 
is liable. But we cannot approve the practice or pass 
it by without reprehension, because the motives of 
those who have adopted it are correct. We are con- 
vinced that it is itself erroneous ; we know that its 
abuses have become intolerable, and we think that 
they ought forthwith to be abated. 1 To effect this, 
1 We do not wish to be understood to imply, that American zoologists 
alone are obnoxious to this charge, but only that tliis reprehensible custom 
has been adopted in a more wholesale manner in this country than in 
Europe. In proof of this we will mention some of the most remarkable 
.examples. In a series of memoirs by one author, published in the 3th. 
