Notices of New Books. 5189 



stances have been of no importance. But such is not the case : there 

 is an order and method throughout Nature, which shows that every 

 individual portion of it has been adjusted by the Master's hand, and 

 that nothing has been left to chance. Those beads (to follow up the 

 metaphor), of countless magnitudes and hues, have had their proper 

 places allotted to them, — and moreover with such care and regularity, 

 that a complete plan or scheme of distribution is at once conspicuous. 

 Although there are not even two amongst that enormous multitude 

 which are precisely alike (for every species, however it may resemble 

 its next ally, has some distinctive feature of its own), we immediately 

 perceive that those beads which have most in common are, as it were, 

 attracted to each other, — so as, by their close approximation, or con- 

 tact, to create excrescences and stripes, of divers kinds, along the 

 entire length of the cord. If we assume now that the red beads have 

 been collected together to the length (for instance) of a yard, and that 

 within that space a dozen protuberances, of discordant aspects and 

 dimensions, have (by the union of those beads which more nearly 

 simulate each other) been brought about, we shall have a very fail- 

 idea of the ordinary grouping of the animate tribes. The red beads, 

 taken in the mass, may be liked to a perfect ' family ; ' the different 

 gibbosities to twelve well-marked 'genera,' which that family includes; 

 whilst the ' species ' (the real dramatis persona, of independent 

 existence, which are nevertheless compelled to occupy the situations 

 we have described, — thus causing the divisions to be mapped out) are 

 here typified, as everywhere, by the several beads themselves." — 

 P. 160. 



From this quotation it is quite clear that, whatever may be Mr. 

 Wollaston's avowed opinion on the naturalness of a linear series, all 

 his thoughts tend to an acknowledgment of the existence of such a 

 series; and, therefore, that, if the theory of a plurality of affinities be 

 true, then all definitions having reference to a line or string of beads 

 must be fallacious. 



Notwithstanding this antagonistic view of the theory of genera be- 

 tween Mr. Wollaston and myself, I cannot close the book without 

 saying that I found it deeply instructive ; nor can I refrain from 

 heartily recommending it to the readers of the * Zoologist,' as one 

 abounding in truthful observation, and well deserving a most studious 

 perusal. 



There is a peculiarity in Mr. Wollaston's style that might easily be 

 amended : the too-frequent use of parentheses, not only as exhibited 

 by printer's signs, but in the context, which every now and then halts 



