20 
Some Considerations of Natural Genera, and Incidental 
References to the Nature of Species. 
By J. W. Tort, EES mkead, Apne sia So7- 
IN spite of the infinite variety of the organic world, the perfection 
of each separate part and the harmonious ‘completeness of the whole 
attract all who are searching for truth. It may be taken for granted, 
I think, that we who are collected here to-night have been bitten, as - 
it were, with the desire to pierce the truths which nature hides from 
the ignorant and yet unfolds to every earnest worker. Each addi- 
tional fact added to the sum total of our knowledge forges one more 
link in the chain, gives us a truer insight into the completeness of the 
whole, and clears up a dark corner hitherto not understood. 
We have got beyond that stage when it was necessary to prove 
that there is a general harmony in organic creation, in spite of the 
dissimilarity of the individual creatures everywhere met with. We 
know that it is possible to recognise an unity of type among creatures 
apparently differently formed, and certainly very widely apart as 
regards their habits and functions. The progressive development 
of animal life is known to all but the absolutely unlearned and 
ignorant. ‘The observation of the first rudimentary structures and 
instincts in the lower animals, of the gradual processes by means of 
which they are developed until they reach their higher phases, their 
maximum of excellence in the highest organic types, are brought to 
our knowledge in our pupilage as naturalists, and the tracing of the 
details relating thereto, the investigation of the structural advance- 
ment we observe, the explanation of such new facts as we may 
discover, are the work of the naturalist. When such facts and 
explanations as relate to structure are given, the naturalist must set 
forth the methods of classification suggested ‘thereby to his mind, the 
method propounded being, of course, one which will accord with the 
various constitutional changes which have been observed by him, and 
which will characterise the relationships that he has been able to 
discover. 
Every system of classification, then, must be based upon the facts 
observed, and must adapt itself to all the various phenomena giving 
rise to these facts, and on these considerations alone should any 
scheme be exclusively deduced. To attempt to do this without 
a previous training is absurd, and yet we find men who build up 
schemes first and then attempt to fit facts to the schemes ; men who 
select an individual species which they miscall a type, and afterwards 
search the fauna through to find the species most closely agreeing 
with it. Bacon writes, “It cannot be that axioms, established by 
