566 DESCRIPTION OF THE MUSEUM. 



species, and were thus enabled to distinguish 

 them from the leopard and the panther which 

 existed at the same time. 



The menagerie having successively possessed a 

 great number of foreign animals which have been 

 dissected, has given rise to the most important 

 researches in comparative anatomy; it has en- 

 riched the collections with many new species, 

 and the facility which it has afforded of observ- 

 ing the animals during their lives has produced 

 results still more interesting. It has furnished 

 the means of discerning between constant and 

 accidental characters, and of solving the impor- 

 tant problem of the distinction of species. It 

 has enabled the zoologist to study the instinct, 

 intelligence and habits of animals ; the influence 

 of education, confinement, domesticity, and change 

 of nourishment ; the phenomena relative to their 

 gestation, to the care which they take of their 

 young, and to the developement and propagation 

 of certain qualities, which in process of time con- 

 stitute peculiar races. 



This institution has given rise to two impor- 

 tant works. The first, entitled la Menagerie du 

 Museum, or a description of the animals which 

 have lived or still exist there, by MM. Lacepede, 

 Cuvier and Geoffroy, with figures drawn from 

 nature by M. Marechal, was published in 180/f? 



