ADVERTISEMENT. 



HE 



Engravings of objects of Natural History contained in the Encyclopaedia Metro- 

 politana have long been held in esteem for their beauty and accuracy. They were 

 \ accompanied by articles of great scientific value, contributed by those eminent Naturalists, 



JOHN FLINT SOUTH, Esq., F.L.S., J. E. GRAY, Esq., F.L.S., and J. F. STEPHENS, Esq., 



F.L.S., F.Z.S. 



The plan, however, on which the first edition of the Encyclopaedia was arranged, 

 was such as to scatter the descriptive details of Natural History inconveniently through 

 twelve quarto volumes of Lexicography. Consequently, when the present Proprietors endeavoured to meet the 

 wishes of the Public by dividing the Encyclopaedia into separate subjects, they were unable to associate the 

 Descriptions of Animals with the Engravings to which they related. 



In order in some measure to remedy this defect, and to meet the existing demand for the Zoological Illustrations, 

 the Proprietors instructed the Editor of this Volume to prepare, from the Contributions above referred to, and from 

 the recent works of other eminent Naturalists, such an account of the Animals depicted in the Engravings as would 

 convey useful and agreeable knowledge of them individually, and afford a systematic view of the Genera, Orders, and 

 Classes to which they belong, and of which they constitute the characteristic Types. 



That commission he has endeavoured to fulfil in the pages now submitted for public acceptance. He wishes it 

 to be understood, however, that the work does not pretend to be a System of Zoology, though the information given 

 in it is placed in systematic order ; neither does it pretend to describe the Animal Kingdom with any degree of 

 completeness, though it embraces, not merely the animals depicted in the Engravings, but many others that modern 

 science has distinguished as forming the boundaries of particular departments of animal life. 



What he trusts the work will be found to do, is to give a distinct view of the great Outlines of Zoology to 

 discriminate the peculiarities of its Divisions and to exhibit the characteristics of those remarkable creatures which, 

 in their several departments, most forcibly arrest the attention of those engaged in the study of the works of 

 Nature. 



London, January 1851. 



