90 



ON THE GENERAL ANALOGY OF 



into general classes. This, in many instances, we are able to do ; and, in 

 such cases we obtain a tolerable insight into the nature of things. But so 

 vast, so unbounded is the theatre before us, so complicated is its machinery, 

 and so closely does one fkct follow up and press upon another, that we are 

 often bewildered and lost in the mighty maze, and are incapable of de- 

 termining the laws by which it is regulated, or of arranging the phaenomena 

 of which it is composed. 



The zoologist, in order to assist his inquiries, divides the whole animal 

 creation into six general heads or classes ; as those of mammals, birds, 

 amphibials, fishes, insects, and worms. Each of these classq^ he subdi- 

 vides into orders ; of each of his orders he makes a distinct section for a 

 multitude of kinds or genera ; and each of his kinds becomes a still more 

 subordinate section for the species or individuals of which the separata 

 kinds consist. But he is perpetually finding, not only that many cases in 

 each of his inferior divisions are so equally allied to other divisions that he 

 itnows not how to arrange them, but that even his classes or first divisions 

 themselves labour under the same difficulty ; since he occasionally meets 

 with animals that by the peculiarity of their construction seem equally to 

 defy all artificial method and all natural order. Thus the myxine glutinosa^ 

 which by Linneus was regarded and ranked as a worm, has been intro- 

 duced by Bloch into the class of fishes, and is now known by the name of 

 gastrobranchus ccecus^ or hag-fish. The siren lacertina^ which was at 

 first contemplated by Linneus as an amphibious animal of a pecuhar 

 genus, was afterwards declared by Camper and Gmelin to be a fish, ap- 

 proaching the nature of an eel, and was arranged accordingly. It has 

 since, however, been restored from the class of fishes to that of amphibials, 

 and is in the present day believed by various zoologists to be nothing 

 , more than a variety of the lizard. And thus the hippopotamus, the tapir, 

 sind the swine, which by Linneus were ranked in the fifth order of mam- 

 mals with the horse, are arranged by Cuvier with the rhinoceros and the 

 sokotyro, that have hitherto formed a part of the second order. 



The eel, in its general habits and appearance, has a near similitude to 

 the serpent ; many of its species live out of the^ water as well as in it ; and, 

 like the serpent, hunt for worms, snails, and other food, over meadows and 

 marshes. 



The platypus anatinus^ or duck bill, (the ornithorhyncus paradoxus of 

 Blumenbach,) one of the many wonders of New South Wales, unites in its 

 form and habits the three classes of birds, quadrupeds, and amphibials. 

 Its feet, which are four, are those of a quadruped ; but each of them is pal- 

 mate or webbed, like a wild fowl's ; and instead of hps it has the precise 

 bill of a shoveler or other broad-billed water bird ; while its body is cover- 

 ed with a fur exactly resembhng an otter's. Yet it lives, like a lizard, 

 chiefly in the water, digs and burrows under the banks of rivers, and feeds 

 on aquatic plants and aquatic animals. The viverra or weasel, in several 

 of its species, approaches the monkey and squirrel tribes ; is playful, a good 

 mimic, and possesses a prehensile tail. The flying squirrel, the flying 

 lizard, or draco volans, and especially the bat, approach in their volant 

 endowment the buoyancy of birds, and are able to fly by winged mem- 

 branes instead of by feathers. The exocetus volitans^ or flying-fish, and 

 several other fishes, derive a similar power from their long pectoral fins ; 

 while the troctilus, or humming-bird, unites the class of birds with that of 

 insects, It is in one of its species, t. minimus^ the least of the feathered 

 ^ibes ; f<?eds, like insects, on the nectar of flowers alope, ancl like the bee . 



