IX THE HISTORY AND SCOPE OF ZOOLOGY 315 



method of classification which was due to the super- 

 ficial Pliny, — viz. one depending, not on structure, 

 but on the medium inhabited by an animal, whether 

 earth, air, or water, — Wotton is led to associate Fishes 

 and Whales as aquatic animals. But this is only a 

 momentary lapse, for he broadly distinguishes the two 

 kinds. 



Conrad Gesner (1516-1565), who was a physician 

 and held professorial chairs in various Swiss cities, is 

 the most voluminous and instructive of these earliest 

 writers on systematic Zoology, and was so highly 

 esteemed that his Historia Animalium was repub- 

 lished a hundred years after his death. His great 

 work appeared in successive parts, — e.g. Vivipara, 

 Ovipara, Aves, Pisces, Serpentes et Scorpio, — and con- 

 tains descriptions and illustrations of a large number 

 of animal forms with reference to the lands inhabited 

 by them. Gesner's work, like that of John Johnstone 

 {h. 1603), who was of Scottish descent and studied at 

 St. Andrews, and like that of Ulysses Aldrovandi of 

 Bologna (6. 1522), was essentially a compilation, more 

 or less critical, of all such records, pictures, and 

 relations concerning beasts, birds, reptiles, fishes, and 

 monsters as could be gathered together by one reading 

 in the great libraries of Europe, travelling from city 

 to city, and frequenting the company of those who 

 either had themselves passed into distant lands or 

 possessed the letters written and sometimes the speci- 

 mens brought home by adventurous persons. 



The exploration of parts of the New World next 

 brought to hand descriptions and specimens of many 



