PREFACE. 
IX 
dinary observer could perceive little utility. In this retro- 
grade movement of British naturalists Mr Pennant led the 
o 
way, and the completion of his British Zoology^ in four vo- 
lumes, in 1777, gave a new aspect to the science in this country. 
This naturalist possessed favourable means for study, and no 
inconsiderable share of industry ; but being rather deficient in 
a knowledge of physiology, he unfortunately seems to have 
undervalued all that his predecessors had gleaned in that fruit- 
ful field, and confined his labours chiefly to an acquaintance 
with the external characters of animals. He succeeded in im- 
parting to his writings a considerable degree of popularity, by 
avoiding all minute details, and introducing occasional remarks 
on the habits of particular species; and by allusions to Greek 
and Roman authors, he interested the classical reader. In his 
account of the Vertebral Animals, his materials were chiefly de- 
rived from the writings of Willoughby, Ray, and Sibbald, 
while Lister supplied the groundwork of the Shells. It is 
in the class Crustacea that Mr Pennant appears chiefly as an 
original author, earning reputation in a department of the 
science which his predecessors had in a great measure neglected. 
The Spiders, Insects, and Zoophytes, did not engage his atten- 
tion. 
In order to facilitate the researches of the student of British 
zoology. Dr Berkenhout published abridged characters of 
the species in 1769, under the title “ Outlines^’' and a third 
edition more enlarged, in 1795, included in the ‘‘ Synopsis of 
the Natural History of Great Britain and Ireland.’"'' In the 
first volume of this work, the characters of the species of Bri- 
tish Animals are drawn up with a degree of care and accuracy 
unequalled in any subsequent publication of a similar kind. 
In 1802 Mr Stewart attempted a similar work, on a more 
enlarged plan, in two volumes, entitled Elements of the Na- 
tural History of the Animal Kingdom. This work includes, 
besides the British species, the characters of the more common 
genera of foreign animals. A new edition appeared in 1817, 
deficient, however, in the account of the more recently publish- 
ed species, and in some instances faulty by introducing the same 
species twice under different genera. 
b 
