AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



THIS work has been designed with a view of furnishing the beginner with an evenly 

 balanced series of drawings, illustrative of the typical facts in the structure of living 

 things. The types chosen are for the most part identical with those adopted in Huxley 

 and Martin's "Elementary Biology." 



The information imparted by a competent teacher ought to receive ample illustration 

 at his hands, and while it is hoped that this book may be of service to the student thus 

 happily placed, in producing it the author has been especially mindful of the less 

 fortunate inquirer, compelled to work unaided in a field beset with snares and pitfalls, 

 and byways which lead only to a laborious idleness. 



An extensive and fully illustrated literature is within reach of the student, when 

 once he has acquired that method which can alone enable him to use it rightly; and 

 where this is the case for the organisms here dealt with, attempts have been made to 

 supplement it as far as possible. 



All the figures are drawn, unless otherwise stated, from preparations made specially 

 with a view to the capacity of this work, and the plates are arranged in that order in 

 which it is most desirable the beginner should work them over. The paper used in 

 printing will take colour, provided the ordinary precautions are observed to avoid going 

 over the same surface twice while wet. 



The text is confined exclusively to a description of the precise manner in which 

 each preparation was made, and as a number of valuable papers on many of the 



