134 LECTURES ON MOLLUSC A. 



ble to work upon. At present a large proportion of every author's 

 time is taken up with trying to find out^ and that under ordinary cir- 

 cumstances with necessary errors, what his predecessors mean. If 

 this is true even of the most careful writers, such as C. B. Adams, 

 Conrad, &c , what can be said of the imagination of Rafinesque. 



As to questions of generic nomenclature, it is hoped that the present 

 climax of confusion will make the necessity felt of agreeing on some 

 common basis. At present some writers endeavor to follow the rules 

 of the British and American associations; others avowedly set them 

 at defiance. To revive the careless work of old writers, to the upset- 

 ting of those whose useful toil has been recognized by general accept- 

 ance, appears worse than folly. If any one will compare the names of 

 the Messrs. Adams and of Dr. Gray, who profess to follow the same 

 rule of absolute priority, it will be found that ancient genera were so 

 ill defined that even those who most desire to understand them, have 

 interpreted them quite differently. Under these circumstances, it is 

 well for ardent young naturalists not necessarily to adopt all the inter- 

 pretations now offered of old names, from the bewitching love of nov- 

 elty ; but to remember that use and accuracy are matters far more 

 important than supposed justice to men whose works might as well 

 have been forgotten. Every naturalist ought to start with a feeling 

 that it is of no consequence what becomes of his own names and his 

 own reputation, if the " increase and diffusion of knowledge among 

 men" is promoted by his own retirement ; and what he thus feels for 

 himself, he should be willing to accord to those whose works are as 

 inaccessible as they have proved to be injuriously confusing. In ar- 

 ranging the nomenclature for this report, we have endeavored to pre- 

 serve as far as possible the names in common use; and when dead 

 names have been revived, they are taken not as the works of Link or 

 Klein, but as the names of Gray or Adams, who have given an accu- 

 rate diagnosis to what before was of uncertain import. By all means, 

 let us spend our time in the living present. The naturalist is not 

 required to be the archaeologist. 



The study of Mollusks in connection with their geographical distri- 

 bution is a matter of the very first importance. For this reason, all 

 persons who will carefully note what shells are found living, what 

 dead, and what fossil, in their own localities, and distribute them 

 accordingly, may be rendering the most essential service. Our knowl- 

 edge of the American faunas is by no means so complete as of those of 

 Europe : and as men of intelligence are now to be found in every part 

 of the continent, and the young are now learning freely in the public 

 schools what in the Old World has long been the property only of the 

 learned few, we ought to find our information accumulating with giant 

 strides. 



To young naturalists, we may be allowed to say that he who will 

 carefully work up the labors of his predecessors, and make out their 

 synonymy, is doing far more useful and more honorable labor than he 

 who only affixes his own name to a number of fresh species. 



If space and time had permitted, it might have been interesting to 

 have followed up this sketch of the generic forms of Mollusks, with an 

 account of their geographical and geological distribution. But this 

 has been done so admirably by Woodward, in the latter part of his 



