182 SVEN LOVEN, ON TIIE ECIIINOIDKA UESCRIBEl) BY Ll.\X.i':L'S. 



been acquiiiuted witli such comraon species ncar at hand as 

 thc Strongylocentnis dröbakensis and the Spatangus purpnreus, 

 all these materials would have afForded him a richer lield of 

 inquiiy and given due expansion to his conceptiou of the 

 Echinoideau type, but the increased variety of diffeient forms 

 would not have induced him to regard them all otherwise 

 tlian as members of onc sinule oenvis. Before his tinie some 

 authors, in thcir attempts to reduce in to order the animal 

 forms known to them, had thouo-ht to ereate natural genera 

 by iixiug on certaiu preconccived ideas of different structural 

 combinations, and then inserting the speeies at hand into the 

 compartments of the framework thus contrived, sometimes even 

 with one or the other place prudeutly left open, in reserve for 

 eventual accessions ^). ]\Ictliods like this mnst have appcared 

 »absurd» enough to one who, like Linn.eus, taught-) that 

 the Genus is given in Nature, and laid down the Avell-known 

 maxim: 



Scias Characterein iioii constituere Genus, Sfd (ieiiiis Characlerciu. 

 Cbaracterem iiiicre e Genere, nou Genus e Cliaractcre. 

 Characterem non esse, ut Genus fiat, sed ut Genus noscatiir. 



In the whole of the Echinoids before him he saw only 

 another of the many generical groups he had distinguished, 

 and most of which still survive, developed into Families, Or- 

 ders and even Classes rieh in species distributed among nu- 

 merous genera of narrower limits. Within his genvis Echinvis, 

 however, scattered members of its type as were the species 

 he knew or at any time saw, and brought together by chance 

 rather thaa by seleetion, he was soon familiar with their 

 leading featvires, created a terminology, and keenly appre- 

 ciatinor even minor characters easilv overlooked, caused them 

 to reveal their different degrees of signiheance and afiinity, 

 and variovisly to approximate into beginnings of natviral divi- 

 sions, destined to attain fvvture importance. First among the 



') Genera hinc sola natura duce, constituenda esse, sccundum dicto- 

 rum foraminum (aperturie oris et ani) positioncm, decrevi, mo.xque cum 

 meis Echinis fecl periculum ; quod mihi in distributione eorum in Mnseo 

 meo satis cessit fullciter; Breyn, Schediasma, p. 49. — Klein in his Ta- 

 bula {general is Metliudi Zoologicie hjis: Aninialia pedata, Cap. I, Sect. II, 

 (Jlass. IV. I'cdum auteriorum digiti conjuncti, posterioriuii fissi; ubi talia 

 Dccurruut. Dispusitio Echinoderuiatum, p. öS. Compare Cakus, Gesc.h. d. 

 Zool. in Deutschl., p. 477. 



2) Phil. But., ir.'J, p. 100; 102, p. 101; 1(59, p. 119. 



