PLANT-LIKE ANIMALS. 63 



or polyp ; we prefer, and shall use as the simplest, 

 the latter term. 



An apothecary in Naples, Ferrante Imperato, is 

 said to have been the first naturalist who distinctly 

 declared that some of these were animals. His work 

 was printed at Venice, in 1599. It was afterwards 

 republished, yet so entirely was it forgotten, that 

 when Peyronnet announced the same discovery to 

 the Academy of Sciences in Paris, more than a 

 hundred and twenty years afterwards, it was re- 

 ceived by that body as new, and open to the objec- 

 tions usually entertained against what is novel. 

 Most unworthy was the treatment with which he 

 met ; and while we deplore it, we cannot but lament 

 that it is one of a multitude of similar instances. 

 When will men, on an assertion being made, ask for 

 the evidence on which it rests ; and only when this 

 is unsatisfactory, discard the declaration ? Hasty 

 and prejudiced judgments lead to the rejection of 

 many truths, and to the support, perpetuation, and 

 increase of formidable errors. 



In the present instance, it ought to have been 

 enough to avert doubt, censure, and .obloquy, that 

 Peyronnet dealt not with speculations and fancies, 

 but with actual observation. On the coasts of 

 France and of Barbary, their native sites, he had 

 carefully studied the polyps which the fishermen 

 brought him after their searches for coral ; ascertained 

 that, unlike blossoms or flowers, which some had 

 considered them, they wore the same appearance at 



