Xxll PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
Besides this, there is an excellent work of M. Tiedemann on 
the anatomy of the Echinodermata that received the prize of 
the Institute some years ago, that will shortly appear—it will 
leave nothing unsaid with respect to these curious animals. 
The Corals and the Infusoria, allowing no field for anatomical 
investigations, have been briefly disposed of. ‘The new work 
of M. de Lamarck will supply my deficiencies(1). 
With respect to authors, I can only mention, here, those 
who have furnished me with general views, or who were the 
origin of such in my own mind(2). There are many others 
to whom I am indebted for particular facts, whose names I 
have carefully quoted wherever I have made use of them. 
They will be found on every page of my book. Should I 
have omitted to do justice to any, it must be attributed to in- 
voluntary forgetfulness—no property, in my eyes, is more 
sacred than the conceptions of the mind, and the custom, too 
common among naturalists, of making plagiarisms by a change 
of names, has always appeared to me a crime. 
The publication of my Comparative Anatomy will now 
occupy me every moment; the materials are ready, great 
quantities of preparations and drawings are finished and ar- 
ranged ; and I shall be careful in dividing the work into parts, 
each of which will form a whole, so that should my physical 
powers prove insuflicient for the completion of the totality of 
my plan, what I shall have produced will still form entire 
suites, and the materials I have collected be ready for the 
hand of him who may undertake the continuation of my la- 
bours. 
Jardin du Roti, 1816. 
(1) I have this moment received, /’ Histoire des Polypiers coralligéenes flexibles of 
M. Lamouroux, which furnishes an excellent supplement to M. Lamarck. 
(2) M. de Blainville has recently published general zoological tables, which I 
regret came too late for me to profit by; having appeared when my book was nearly 
printed. 
