154 PROGRESS IN ZOOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE xn 



It may be not without interest in commencing our work at 

 this meeting to cast our eyes back and take stock, as it were, 

 of the knowledge of a hundred years ago, and of that of the 

 present time, and see what advances have been made ; to look 

 at the living world as it was known to Linnaeus and as it is 

 known to ourselves. The Systema Natures, the last edition of 

 which, revised by the author, was published in 1766, will be 

 a convenient basis for the comparison ; but as the subject is 

 one which, even in a most superficial outline, might reach such 

 lengths as would well tire out the most patient of audiences, 

 and absorb time which will be more profitably occupied by 

 the valuable contributions which are forthcoming from other 

 members of the Association, I will merely take a small section 

 of the work, about 100 pages out of the first of the four 

 volumes, those devoted to the first class MAMMALIA. The 

 comparison of this part is perhaps the easiest, as the contrast 

 is the least striking, and the progress has been comparatively 

 the slowest. The knowledge of large, accessible, and attractive- 

 looking animals had naturally preceded that of minute and 

 obscure organisms, and hence, while in many other depart- 

 ments the advance has altogether revolutionised the know- 

 ledge of Linnaeus, in the Vertebrated Classes, especially the 

 one of which I shall now speak, it has only extended and 

 reformed it. 



In taking the Systema Natures of Linnaeus, the comparison 

 is certainly carried back somewhat beyond the hundred years 

 which have elapsed since his death, and the brilliant contribu- 

 tions to the knowledge of the Mammalia of Buffon and 

 Daubenton, just then beginning to be known, and the 

 systematic compilation of Erxleben (published in 1777), are 

 ignored ; but for the present purpose, especially considering 

 the limited time at my disposal, it will be best not to go beyond 

 the actual text of the work in question. 



Before considering systematically the different groups into 

 which Linnaeus divides the class, I must remark in passing 

 upon what is the greatest, and indeed most marvellous 

 difference between the knowledge of Zoology of our time and 

 that of Linnaeus. Now we know that the animals at present 

 existing upon the earth are merely the survivors of an 



