54 Ji new species of Siren. 



that have been under my observation, I never saw them in any 

 position whilst in the water, where it could be imagined that 

 they were used in breathing. They were generally extended 

 and undulator}', as if to direct or accelerate the animal's pro- 

 gress through the water. When the Siren lacertina wishes 

 to inspire, he rises to the surface ; this is however scarcely 

 three times in the course of twelve hours, and he expires under 

 the water about once in two hours. I never saw the Siren 

 striata expire any air : although they rise occasionally to 

 the surface, it is impossible to observe whether they then 

 inhale. 



How apt are we to suffer ourselves, in our researches, to 

 be drawn aside from certainty and truth by a foolish desire of 

 accounting for every thing ! Nature is covered with a thick 

 veil, which cannot be penetrated : a proud spirit and an am- 

 bitious presumption may lead us to suppose that we have been 

 enabled to remove the covering which she throws over her 

 operations, but every day's experience shows us the absurdity 

 of publishing our vague hypotheses for established truth, and 

 the still greater absurdity of attempting to defend them. The 

 Siren lacertina is not an inhabitant of the water, but rarely 

 and onlv accidentally found in it, when it leaves its subterra- 

 nean abode in the firm and moist clay. It would be difficult 

 to say, therefore, of what use gills would be to it. The Ara- 

 phiuma, (Chrysodon-of others,) which in so many respects re- 

 sembles it, and which inhabits the water, has naked spiracula ; 

 an animal that could use fringed coverings to them, if they 

 were to be employed as gills, has them not ; whilst another, to 

 which they could be of little or no use for a similar purpose, is 

 abundantly furnished with them. 



The desire of grouping together animals in classes and or- 

 ders, as if they were positively so placed by nature, rendered 

 it necessary, in the minds of the older naturalists, to find 

 something common to the genus Siren, and the cartilaginous 

 fishes, which were then arranged among the amphibia. Hence 

 the contradictory descriptions of this animal, and the assertion 

 that it is furnished with external or internal gills. 



