CHARACTERS OF ANIMALS. 129 



duals of a species, we shall probably fix upon tlrose cha- 

 racters which distinguish the genus, and which are, there- 

 fore, common to all the species which it includes. 



The descriptions in Natural History are daily becoming 

 more laboured in their details. This arises from the in- 

 crease of species, and the necessity of determining the cha- 

 racters on which their claim depends. Parts are now stu- 

 died with care, as furnishing specific marks which were for- 

 merly overlooked as useless, and the characters by which 

 species were designated, are now employed to distinguish 

 families or orders. 



In Great Britain, during the latter half of the last cen- 

 tury, descriptions of animals were usually drawn up in a 

 very superficial manner. The internal structure was in a 

 great measure overlooked, and the more obvious varieties 

 of colour were selected, rather than the more characteristic 

 appearances of the shape. Such, generally, are the de- 

 scriptions of PENNANT, SHAW, DENOVAN, and even MON- 

 TAGU. This is the more surprising, as the eminent na- 

 turalists who flourished towards the end of the seventeenth 

 and beginning of the eighteenth centuries (the golden age of 

 British Zoology), excelled in the minute details with which 

 their descriptions abounded. The writings of LISTER, 

 WILLOUGHBY, RAY and ELLIS, furnish very striking ex- 

 amples. 



It would contribuie greatly to the progress of the 

 Science of Zoology, if the descriptions of species were drawn 

 up in reference to all the different organs, and in the order 

 in which they have been already detailed, with additional 

 notices of their physical and geographical distribution. The 

 observations which have already been made, could, in this 

 manner, be readily classified, and the blanks which require 

 to be filled up would become more apparent. 



VOL. II. I 



