146 ON SYSTEMATIC ZOOLOGY. 



wide apart, and the introduction of the aquatic orders 

 into the gap : so that our author commenced in this 

 class, as he had already done in the Mammalia, with 

 making a retrograde movement in science, by attempting 

 to annul the previous arrangements of the great Ari- 

 stotle. In this respect his system is certainly inferior to 

 that of WiUughby, which, however obscure and confused 

 in other respects, preserved a clear distinction between 

 the land and the water birds. Even the most devoted 

 followers of the Systema NaturcB — as Pennant, Latham, 

 Shaw,&c. — protested against thisviolation of nature, and 

 rejected it. As to the division of the perching birds 

 into the two orders, of PiceB and Passeres, we can 

 only account for it by supposing that Linneeus thought 

 the order itself, although natural, was too large for 

 artificial arrangement : but in that case, one would have 

 thought, he would have done as M. Cuvier afterwards 

 did ; that is, keep the perching birds in one order, and 

 place the climbers in another :^this would have been more 

 easy of comprehension either in a natural or an artificial 

 system. With the exception, however, of this oversight, 

 the remaining of the Linnsean orders are similar to those 

 long before understood by Aristotle ; and, indeed, so 

 obvious to every one, that it would have been surprising 

 had they escaped notice. 



(200.) The genera arranged under these orders wiU 

 now be enumerated. Nothing, perhaps, wiU show more 

 forcibly the admirable clearness and precision with which 

 this extraordinary man perceived and defined the es- 

 sential or most striking character of his groups, than the 

 short synopsis by which each of these genera are cha- 

 racterised. 



I. AcciPiiREs. Birds of Prey. Upper mandible with an 

 angular projection. 



Vultur. Vtdtur. Bill hooked, naked. 



Falco. Hawk. Bill hooked, covered at the base with a cere. 

 Strix. Owl. Bill hooked, with a frontlet of covered bris- 

 tles. 

 Xianius. Shrike. Bill straightish, notched. 



