INTRODUCTION vii 



life-forms around us. A third, probably the wisest, believes in a method 

 compounded of both. This is the theory of the teachers whose labors 

 have produced THE NEW NATURAL HISTORY. 



This work is under the editorship and largely from the pen of Mr. Richard 

 Lydekker, whose contributions to Geographical and General Zoology .have given 

 him a place among the most eminent living naturalists. It consists of six 

 large quarto volumes (12 sections), elaborately illustrated, and treating 

 broadly the whole Animal Kingdom. 



Each large group is introduced in a synoptic chapter, detailing its general 

 characteristics, its features of especial interest, its relation to the other 

 groups, its geographical distribution, and the more important known facts 

 bearing on its evolution. 



Then follow chapters dealing in detail with the more interesting members 

 of that group from all over the globe. Admirable portraits from the pencils 

 of the best artists are found on nearly every page, and in a chapter on the 

 habits of the creature are condensed the interesting facts that are known 

 concerning it. Finally, to each group is added a review of its fossil rela- 

 tives, with remarks on their affinities. 



Volumes I, II, and half of III are devoted to Mammalia, and are entirely 

 by Mr. Lydekker, The latter half of Volume III and all of Volume IV are 

 given to Birds ; of the twenty-one chapters, eleven are by Mr. Lydekker, five 

 by Rev H. A. MacPherson, three by Dr R. Bowdler Sharpe, and two by Mr. 

 W. R. Oglivie Grant. 



Volume V is on Reptiles and Fishes, and is entirely by Mr. Lydekker. 

 Volume VI is on the Invertebrates; it contains sixteen chapters, of which 

 four are by Mr. R. I. Pocock, three by Mr. Edgar A. Smith, two by Mr. 

 Octavius Pickard-Cambridge, two by Messrs. H. and M. Bernard, two by Mr. 

 R. Kirkpatrick, two by Mr. C. J. Gahan, and one by Mr. F. A. Bather. 

 All of the contributors are men of recognized high standing in their 

 special departments. 



The scope of the work being cosmopolitan raises the question of its 

 especial adaptability to American use and this justifies a somewhat geograph- 

 ical analysis. In the two and a half volumes devoted to the Mammalia some 

 twelve hundred species are treated individually in more or less detail, and of 

 these, about four hundred, that is one-third, are American. In some of the 

 groups the proportion is yet greater. Thus out of one hundred and eighty 

 Rodents nearly one-half are New World species; of one hundred and fifty 

 Bats, more than half are American; of fifty odd Cetaceans, thirty-four, or 

 about two-thirds, are found in American waters; and out of the twenty-four 

 Edentates described, nineteen, or more than three-fourths, are species 

 peculiar to the Western Hemisphere. 



