72 MEMOIRS OP 



ceeding volumes. The fourth volume contains the family 

 of the Joues Cuirassees, many of which, and especially 

 those of the tropical seas, present themselves under extraor- 

 dinary and exaggerated forms, and to which belong the 

 beautiful little sticklebacks of our running streams. The 

 fifth volume embraces the Scieno'ides ; the sixth, the Spa- 

 roides, and the Menides ; the seventh, the Squammipennes, 

 and the Phaiyngiens Labyrinthiformes ; and the eighth and 

 ninth, the Scomberoides. Each volume is closed by the 

 additions and corrections which the authors have found it 

 requisite to make during the progress of their publication ; 

 and I have offered this short list, because it has been a 

 question often repeated, even to myself, how far this noble 

 work was advanced when its progress w^as so grievously ar- 

 rested. It is the intention of M. Valenciennes to proceed as 

 rapidly as possible with the rest, designating those parts 

 which are solely due to the exalted genius, under whose 

 auspices he has become worthy of continuing this extensive 

 and admirable enterprise.* 



In noticing the Ichthyology. I have had occasion to speak 

 of M. Cuvier as the historian of the science to which he 

 was devoted ; and this leads me to mention here, the an- 

 nual reports made by him at the institute, in which, from 

 the age of twenty-six, he had been accustomed to lay before 

 that body the labours of its members and correspondents, 

 thereby forming a general history of science from that pe- 



^ I have always been very much struck with one part of this work, and 

 J,herefore cannot forbear calling the attention of the reader to it. It is the 

 •way in which M. Cu\'ier refutes the opinions of M. Geoffroy St. Hilaire, 

 who had long opposed him with considerable warmth. As far as relates 

 to Fishes, M. Cuvier, in notes at the bottom of certain pages, places his 

 antagonist's arguments in two columns, and by the side of them, in two 

 others, sets forth his I'efutations. Not a word of personal feeling is added, 

 not a single argument is brought in, to aid in persuading the reader that he 

 is right ; there are the two systems, equally exposed, and he who peruses 

 them, perfectly at liberty to verify and judge for himself. This ditierence 

 of opinion being 'pursued with acrimony on ^several occasions by M. Geof- 

 froy, it at last became a matter of discussion before the Institute ; and M. 

 Cuvier, who had long remained silent with the most heroic forbearance, at 

 length was mduced to reply. After some little time, M. GeofFroy retired 

 from this direct contest ; but it is to be hoped, that the surviving friends of 

 M. Cuvier will one day publish his opinions separated from his great works, 

 so that they may be accessible to those who may not have ekher time or 

 opportunity to seek them in the general tenor of his pubUcations. 



