THE QUINARY SYSTEM. 



xxxvii 



from the earth * or remains to be discovered by subsequent re- 

 search.f " Intervals," says Mr. MacLeay, " do not lessen the 

 truth of the chain, because some of the links may not yet be 

 discovered.";): 



This is a brief outline of the views upon which animals are 

 arranged in the system in question, so far as I can comprehend it ; 

 yet I have little doubt that it will be said I have fallen into mis- 

 representation ; though in that case I shall be in good company, 

 for, amongst others, Dr. Fleming, § Dr. Virey, || and Mr. Kirby, f 

 have been accused of not understanding the system. If men of 

 their superior powers, and experience also as naturalists, cannot 

 understand the published works of the systematists, I am fairly 

 entitled to infer that they must be unintelligible to inferior minds, 

 and consequently useless to all but a few of the initiated. 

 One thing I am certain of, that I have spared no pains in labour- 

 ing to decypher all the writings of the school which I could pro- 

 cure. But inventors of systems, it may be remarked, are gene- 

 rally very hot and testy when they meet with opposition ; of which 

 (to pass by living examples) Linnaeus himself affords a marked 

 instance; for because Buffon had treated his classification with 

 little respect, he took care never to quote any of his works, 

 " despising," as he says, " those grinning apes and chattering 

 baboons whom I have encountered in my journey." ## 



In the necessarily limited space of an introduction, I cannot go 

 much into detail either in explanation of this system, or in stat- 

 ing such objections to it as have occurred to me ; but I shall 

 endeavour to show that it rests, so far as I can perceive, on very 

 untenable grounds. " In natural history," says Mr. MacLeay, 

 " we have always good reason for suspecting methods," ff and still 

 more, I should say, for suspecting principles. The doctrine of 

 types, if I comprehend it aright, is one of those suspicious prin- 



* Linn. Trans, vol. xiv. p. 54. f Ibid, vol. xiv. p, 409. 



£ Dying Struggle, p. 29. § MacLeay, Dying Struggle, passim. 



|| Zool. Journ. iv. 49. IT Dying Struggle, page 25. 



** Kerr's Linnaeus, p. 13. The original is if possible still stronger. " Rin- 

 gentium Satyrorum cachinnos, meisque bumeris insilientium Cercopitbccomm 

 exultationes sustinui." Linnseus, Syst. Nat. Introitus, ed. 12th. 



ft Horse Entomological, p. 6. 



