XII 

 THE OTHER BEASTS 



With the present essay we shall briDg to a close this 

 series of sketches, and will herein endeavour to collect 

 as it were into a focus, such light as we have been 

 able to obtain with respect to the various groups of 

 animals which have served as our types. The informa- 

 tion as yet conveyed has necessarily been fragmentary. 

 It is time to present it as an orderly whole. 'Jliese dozen 

 chapters have been intended to serve as an introduction to 

 a knowledge of zoology, and especially of the leading 

 section of that primary division of animals to which we 

 ourselves belong. That primary division is made up of 

 all those ci-eatures which have either a " back-bone " or 

 a representative thereof, formed of gristle or some softer 

 substance. As most of such creatures possess, as we do, 

 a spinal column or back- bone, formed of a chain of small 

 bones, each of which is termed a "vertebra," this whole 

 primary division of animals is spoken of as the " verte- 

 brate " division, or the division " vertebrata." This 

 division is often also called a " sub-kingdom," because it 

 and the other "sub-kingdoms" together include all 

 animals, and animals taken as one great whole, have 

 been fancifully regarded as a kingdom. The Animal 

 Kingdom being thus opposed to, and contrasted with, the 

 whole mass of plants or the Vegetable Kingdom. Besides 

 the "sub-kingdom," or primary division, of "vertebrate" 



