xxxii MEMOIR OF SIR J. G. DALYELL. 



'' alteration of generations" that is, that like does not produce like ; but 

 that the resemblance returns in the second generation. Sir John's vo- 

 lumes were noticed in the most nattering manner by such of the press as 

 had access to them. The British and Foreign Medico-Chirurgical Review 

 in particular had a long article entitled " Dalyell, Sars, Dujardin, and 

 Van Beneden on the Development and Metamorphoses of Zoophytes." 

 Speaking of an intended series on the subject, the Eeviewer says : 



" It has happened by a fortunate coincidence, that the long-expected work of Sir John 

 G. Dalyell has been published, just as we were beginning to carry this purpose into effect ; 

 and we most gladly avail ourselves of the opportunity of expressing the high gratification 

 which an examination of its contents has afforded us, and our strong sense of the value of 

 the researches in which the accomplished author has so long been engaged. We can only 

 regret, for his own sake, and for the credit of British science, that some of his results were 

 not earlier made known ; since in the publication of his most remarkable discovery that of 

 the development, from a single polypoid animal, of a pile of young meduste he has been 

 anticipated by continental naturalists. Sir John Dalyell, however, belongs to a race of na- 

 turalists (at present, we are sorry to say, too rare) who pursue the study for its own sake, 

 and not for the honours or rewards to which it may lead ; who are consequently not am- 

 bitious of exciting attention by new and strange announcements of imperfectly observed 

 facts, or ill-digested hypotheses ; who consider that, the more extraordinary a phenomenon 

 appears, the more they arc bound to verify it by careful and long-continued examination ; 

 and who studiously avoid mingling their observations and deductions, but record exactly 

 what they see, aud leave it to others to estimate the value of their facts, and to build upon 

 them such inferences as they may think proper. Since the days of Trembley and Lyonnet, 

 we doubt whether there has been such an example of the patient and consistent devotion 

 of a large portion of a life to one department of natural history, as has been presented by 

 I Sir John G. Dalyell." 



The delay in the publication thus alluded to was occasioned by a 

 dispute and consequent law-process between Sir John and his engraver, 

 owing to which it was delayed for nearly five years. By this untoward 

 circumstance, he was deprived of the full credit of having discovered the 

 splendid hydra, which he " provisionally denominated Medusa stella" from 

 his inability to discover it in the Systema Natures. While his labours 

 were thus locked up, M. Sars, of Norway, produced his work, and obtained 

 that eclat which, by right, ought to have been conceded to Sir John. 

 Professor Fle.ming was quite aware of the progress he had made with his 



