172 SCIENCE SKETCHES. 



in Paris, Poey was one of the original members who 

 founded the Entomological Society of France. 



On returning to Havana in 1833, Poey gave 

 himself still more fully to the study of natural his- 

 tory, and greater practice gave to his drawings 

 and notes more exactness and value. With the 

 appearance of the successive volumes of the "His- 

 toire Naturelle des Poissons," he attempted to iden- 

 tify the fishes of his market, as well as to study 

 their osteology and general anatomy. Animals 

 other than fishes he also tried to study, but in 

 most groups he found the literature in so scattered 

 and unsatisfactory a condition that he rarely ven- 

 tured to publish the results of his observations. 

 Among the fishes, however, thanks to the general 

 work of Cuvier and Valenciennes, and later to that 

 of Dr. Giinther, he felt comparatively sure of his 

 results, and ventured to name as new those which 

 he could not identify. The land-snails of Cuba, 

 too, Poey and his associate, Dr. Juan Gundlach, 

 were able to identify and describe with certainty, 

 as all the species then known were included in the 

 M Monographium Heliceorum Viventium " of Dr. 

 Ludwig Pfeiffer. 



In the year 1842 Poey was appointed to the pro- 

 fessorship of Comparative Anatomy and Zoology 

 in the Royal University of Havana, which chair he 

 still holds, after forty-five years. The University 

 of Havana occupies an ancient monastery building 

 in the heart of the city. Like most such edifices 

 in Cuba and Spain, it is a low building around 

 a paved court, and its whitewashed, time-stained 

 walls have an air of great antiquity. The univer- 



