History uf Conchology ■ 259 



lar whose curious variety was enticing- and provocative to further 

 quest ; Herissant, Scopoli, Brug-uiere, and Olivi, described many spe- 

 cies with their animals, and entered too into physiological questions 

 which it was worthy reasonable men to solve ; Knorr, Davila, Mar- 

 tini and Chemnitz, Schroter, Born, Pennant, Da Costa, and Martyn, 

 set forth at intervals volumes of figures more numerous in species 

 and more correct than had been hitherto .attempted ; and the minute 

 or microscopic species, which notwithstanding' their littleness have 

 played a most important part in the revolutions of our globe, were 

 well illustrated in the works of Soldani, Plancus, Boys and Walker, 

 and of Fichtel and Moll. Yet this array of names only proves a 

 wider spread of the study, — the students may have been, and we think 

 were, mediocrists, — many of them were simply ichniographistsand col- 

 lectors.* We can remember no discovery by which to distinguish 

 the period, for the developement or improvement of an artificial sys- 

 tem, the accumulation of species, and their more accurate discrimi- 

 nation, though points of considerable importance, are not sufficient- 

 ly so to mark an era. Perhaps the most curious and interesting 

 discovery that was made in it is that of the capability of the snail to 

 reproduce its tentacula, eyes, and head, when these have been cut o£F, 

 — the phenomena of which singular reintegration were amply eluci- 

 dated by the experiments of Spallanzani, Bonnet, and others. 



The first to raise us from this enchained slumber was Cuvier. Be- 

 fore this great naturalist entered the field, Poli, a Neapolitan physi- 

 cian, had indeed anatomized with admirable skill the bivalved mollus- 

 ca of his native shores, and had constructed a new arrangement of 

 them from the characters of the animal alone, but partly from the 

 political position of Europe, partly from the very expensive fashion 

 in which Poll's work was published, and its consequent extremely 

 limited circulation, and in part also from the partial application of 

 his system and its didactick character, the erroneousness of his gene- 

 ral views, and the novelty of his nomenclature, — we cannot trace its 

 influence either as diffusive or propulsive of conchology. The result 



* It is most especially necessary to except from this remark John Hunter, 

 but his labours and views were not published, and were not appreciated. " John 

 Hunter was a great discoverer in his own science ; but one who well knew him 

 has told us, that few of his contemporaries perceived the ultimate object of his 

 pursuits ; and his strong and solitary genius laboured to perfect his designs 

 without the solace of sympathy, without one cheering approbation." — D'Israeli's 

 Literary Character, Vol. i. p. 146. See Abernethy's Physiological Lectures, p. 

 193, for a list of the Mollusca anatomized and exhibited in Hunter's Museum ; 

 also p. 217, 263. 



