

HE great group of animals 

 briefly considered in the fol- 

 lowing pages has been singu- 

 larly unfortunate in the names 

 that have been bestowed upon it. The majority 

 of the creatures comprised in it have been described 

 as Shell -fish by the non - scientific person, and as 

 such associated with forms so dissimilar as crabs 

 and lobsters, which resemble oysters and whelks 

 only in the fact that they are not fishes. On the 

 other hand, when the great Cuvier was seeking a 

 name for the entire class in wliich cuttles, snails, 

 bivalves, and slugs are included, and wishing to 

 indicate the soft, boneless character of their bodies, 

 he selected the word Mollusca, derived from the 

 Latin mollis, soft. But it is not a very distinctive 

 name, for there are many soft boneless creatures not 

 included in the group, and moreover the Romans 

 used tlie name for a kind of nut witli a soft shell. 



