Divisions of Life and lime 



name is in use among savages to-day. And as 

 names liave become changed by use, ceased to 

 be descriptive, and used merely to designate 

 the individuals to whom they are given, so sci- 

 entific names have been cut down to two parts. 

 The first of these is the generic name, and in- 

 cludes all closely related species; the second, 

 or specific name, is restricted to one species or 

 special kind of animal. And as scientific books 

 were formerly written in Latin because that 

 was the common language of scientific men, so 

 Latin is still used for the names. It must be 

 understood that a scientific name does not neces- 

 sarily mean anything ; it is simply a handle by 

 which to lay hold of some particular kind of 

 animal, and had such a method been agreed 

 upon, the species might have been lettered and 

 numbered, much as astronomers have done 

 with the stars. 



Kepresentatives of the larger divisions, or 

 classes, of back-boned animals are familiar to 

 most of us, but there is an unfortunate tend- 

 ency to confine the name animal to mammals, 

 instead of allowing it to include, as it properly 



33 



