FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[107]Charles Bonnet (1720–1793), a Swiss naturalist, is famous for his work on Aphides and their parthenogenetic generation, on the mode of reproduction in the Polyzoa, and on the respiration of insects. After the age of thirty-four, when his eyesight became impaired, he began his premature speculations, which did not add to his reputation. Judging, however, by an extract from his writings by D’Archiac (Introduction à l’Étude de la Paléontologie stratigraphique, ii., p. 49), he had sound ideas on the theory of descent, claiming that “la diversité et la multitude des conjunctions, peut-être même la diversité des climats et des nourritures, ont donné naissance à de nouvelles espèces ou à des individus intermédiaires” (Œuvres d’Hist. nat. et de Philosophie, in-8vo, p. 230, 1779).[108]See his remark: “On a dit avec raison que tout ce qui a vie provient d’un auf” (Mémoires de Physique, etc., 1797, p. 272). He appears, however, to have made the simplest organisms exceptions to this doctrine.[109]Elementa physiologiae corporis humani, iv. Lausanne, 1762.[110]Theoria generationis, 1774.[111]Mémoires de Physique, (1797), p. 250.[112]Mémoires de Physique, etc. (1797), p. 272.[113]Huxley’s “Evolution in Biology” (Darwiniana, p. 192), where be quotes from Bonnet’s statements, which “bear no small resemblance to what is understood by evolution at the present day.”[114]Buffon did not accept Bonnet’s theory of preëxistent germs, but he assumed the existence of “germes accumulés” which reproduced parts or organs, and for the production of organisms he imagined “molécules organiques.” Réaumur had previously (1712) conjectured that there were “germes cachés et accumulés” to account for the regeneration of the limbs of the crayfish. The ideas of Bonnet on germs are stated in hisMémoires sur les Salamandres(1777–78–80) and in hisConsidérations sur les corps organisés(1762.)[115]Mémoires de Physique, etc., pp. 318, 319, 324–359. Yet the idea of a sort of continuity between the inorganic and the organic world is expressed by Verworn.[116]General Physiology(English trans., 1899, p. 17). In France vitalism was founded by Bordeu (1722–1766), developed further by Barthez (1734–1806) and Chaussier (1746–1828), and formulated most distinctly by Louis Dumas (1765–1813). Later vitalists gave it a thoroughly mystical aspect, distinguishing several varieties, such as thenisus formativusor formative effort, to explain the forms of organisms, accounting for the fact that from the egg of a bird, a bird and no other species always develops (l. c., p. 18).[117]Recherches sur l’organisation des corps vivans(1802), p. 70. The same view was expressed inMémoires de physique(1797), pp. 254–257, 386.[118]Here might be quoted for comparison other famous definitions of life:“Life is the sum of the functions by which death is resisted.”—Bichat.“Life is the result of organization.”—(?)“Life is the principle of individuation.”—Coleridge ex. Schelling.“Life is the twofold internal movement of composition and decomposition, at once general and continuous.”—De Blainville, who wisely added that there are “two fundamental and correlative conditions inseparable from the living being—an organism and a medium.”“Life is the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations.”—Herbert Spencer.

[107]Charles Bonnet (1720–1793), a Swiss naturalist, is famous for his work on Aphides and their parthenogenetic generation, on the mode of reproduction in the Polyzoa, and on the respiration of insects. After the age of thirty-four, when his eyesight became impaired, he began his premature speculations, which did not add to his reputation. Judging, however, by an extract from his writings by D’Archiac (Introduction à l’Étude de la Paléontologie stratigraphique, ii., p. 49), he had sound ideas on the theory of descent, claiming that “la diversité et la multitude des conjunctions, peut-être même la diversité des climats et des nourritures, ont donné naissance à de nouvelles espèces ou à des individus intermédiaires” (Œuvres d’Hist. nat. et de Philosophie, in-8vo, p. 230, 1779).

[108]See his remark: “On a dit avec raison que tout ce qui a vie provient d’un auf” (Mémoires de Physique, etc., 1797, p. 272). He appears, however, to have made the simplest organisms exceptions to this doctrine.

[109]Elementa physiologiae corporis humani, iv. Lausanne, 1762.

[110]Theoria generationis, 1774.

[111]Mémoires de Physique, (1797), p. 250.

[112]Mémoires de Physique, etc. (1797), p. 272.

[113]Huxley’s “Evolution in Biology” (Darwiniana, p. 192), where be quotes from Bonnet’s statements, which “bear no small resemblance to what is understood by evolution at the present day.”

[114]Buffon did not accept Bonnet’s theory of preëxistent germs, but he assumed the existence of “germes accumulés” which reproduced parts or organs, and for the production of organisms he imagined “molécules organiques.” Réaumur had previously (1712) conjectured that there were “germes cachés et accumulés” to account for the regeneration of the limbs of the crayfish. The ideas of Bonnet on germs are stated in hisMémoires sur les Salamandres(1777–78–80) and in hisConsidérations sur les corps organisés(1762.)

[115]Mémoires de Physique, etc., pp. 318, 319, 324–359. Yet the idea of a sort of continuity between the inorganic and the organic world is expressed by Verworn.

[116]General Physiology(English trans., 1899, p. 17). In France vitalism was founded by Bordeu (1722–1766), developed further by Barthez (1734–1806) and Chaussier (1746–1828), and formulated most distinctly by Louis Dumas (1765–1813). Later vitalists gave it a thoroughly mystical aspect, distinguishing several varieties, such as thenisus formativusor formative effort, to explain the forms of organisms, accounting for the fact that from the egg of a bird, a bird and no other species always develops (l. c., p. 18).

[117]Recherches sur l’organisation des corps vivans(1802), p. 70. The same view was expressed inMémoires de physique(1797), pp. 254–257, 386.

[118]Here might be quoted for comparison other famous definitions of life:“Life is the sum of the functions by which death is resisted.”—Bichat.“Life is the result of organization.”—(?)“Life is the principle of individuation.”—Coleridge ex. Schelling.“Life is the twofold internal movement of composition and decomposition, at once general and continuous.”—De Blainville, who wisely added that there are “two fundamental and correlative conditions inseparable from the living being—an organism and a medium.”“Life is the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations.”—Herbert Spencer.

[118]Here might be quoted for comparison other famous definitions of life:

“Life is the sum of the functions by which death is resisted.”—Bichat.

“Life is the result of organization.”—(?)

“Life is the principle of individuation.”—Coleridge ex. Schelling.

“Life is the twofold internal movement of composition and decomposition, at once general and continuous.”—De Blainville, who wisely added that there are “two fundamental and correlative conditions inseparable from the living being—an organism and a medium.”

“Life is the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations.”—Herbert Spencer.

Duringthe century preceding the time of Lamarck, botany had not flourished in France with the vigor shown in other countries. Lamarck himself frankly stated in his address to the Committee of Public Instruction of the National Convention that the study of plants had been for a century neglected by Frenchmen, and that the great progress which it had made during this time was almost entirely due to foreigners.

“I am free to say that since the distinguished Tournefort the French have remained to some extent inactive in this direction; they have produced almost nothing, unless we except some fragmentary mediocre or unimportant works. On the other hand, Linné in Sweden, Dilwillen in England, Haller in Switzerland, Jacquin in Austria, etc., have immortalized themselves by their own works, vastly extending the limit of our knowledge in this interesting part of natural history.”

What led young Lamarck to take up botanical studies, his botanical rambles about Paris, and his longer journeys in different parts of France and in other countries, his six years of unremitting labor on hisFlore Française, and the immediate fame it brought him, culminating in his election as amember of the French Academy, have been already recounted.

Lamarck was thirty-four when hisFlore Françaiseappeared. It was not preceded, as in the case of most botanical works, by any preliminary papers containing descriptions of new or unknown species, and the three stout octavo volumes appeared together at the same date.

The first volume opens with a report on the work made by MM. Duhamel and Guettard. Then follows theDiscours Préliminaire, comprising over a hundred pages, while the main body of the work opens with thePrincipes Élémentaires de Botanique, occupying 223 pages. The work was a general elementary botany and written in French. Before this time botanists had departed from the artificial system of Linné, though it was convenient for amateurs in naming their plants. Jussieu had proposed his system of natural families, founded on a scientific basis, but naturally more difficult for the use of beginners. To obviate the matter Lamarck conceived and proposed the dichotomic method for the easy determination of species. No new species were described, and the work, written in the vernacular, was simply a guide to the indigenous plants of France, beginning with the cryptogams and ending with the flowering plants. A second edition appeared in 1780, and a third, edited and remodelled by A. P. De Candolle, and forming six volumes, appeared in 1805–1815. This was until within a comparatively few years the standard French botany.

Soon after the publication of hisFlore Françaiseheprojected two other works which gave him a still higher position among botanists. HisDictionnaire de Botaniquewas published in 1783–1817, forming eight volumes and five supplementary ones. The first two and part of the third volume were written by Lamarck, the remainder by other botanists, who completed it after Lamarck had abandoned botanical studies and taken up his zoölogical work. His second great undertaking wasL’Illustration des Genres(1791–1800), with a supplement by Poiret (1823).

Cuvier speaks thus of these works:

“L’Illustration des Genresis a work especially fitted to enable one to acquire readily an almost complete idea of this beautiful science. The precision of the descriptions and of the definitions of Linnæus is maintained, as in the institutions of Tournefort, with figures adapted to give body to these abstractions, and to appeal both to the eye and to the mind, and not only are the flowers and fruits represented, but often the entire plant. More than two thousand genera are thus made available for study in a thousand plates in quarto, and at the same time the abridged characters of a vast number of species are given.“TheDictionnairecontains more details of the history with careful descriptions, critical researches on their synonymy, and many interesting observations on their uses or on special points of their organizations. The matter is not all original in either of the works, far from it, but the choice of figures is skilfully made, the descriptions are drawn from the best authors, and there are a large number which relate to species and also some genera previously unknown.”

“TheDictionnairecontains more details of the history with careful descriptions, critical researches on their synonymy, and many interesting observations on their uses or on special points of their organizations. The matter is not all original in either of the works, far from it, but the choice of figures is skilfully made, the descriptions are drawn from the best authors, and there are a large number which relate to species and also some genera previously unknown.”

Lamarck himself says that after the publication of hisFlore Française, his zeal for work increasing,and after travelling by order of the government in different parts of Europe, he undertook on a vast scale a general work on botany.

“This work comprised two distinct features. In the first (Le Dictionnaire), which made a part of the new encyclopedia, the citizen Lamarck treats of philosophical botany, also giving the complete description of all the genera and species known. An immense work from the labor it cost, and truly original in its execution.... The second treatise, entitledIllustration des Genres, presents in the order of the sexual system the figures and the details of all the genera known in botany, and with a concise exposition of the generic characters and of the species known. This work, unique of its kind, already contains six hundred plates executed by the best artists, and will comprise nine hundred. Also for more than ten years the citizen Lamarck has employed in Paris a great number of artists. Moreover, he has kept running three separate presses for different works, all relating to natural history.”

Cuvier in hisÉlogealso adds:

“It is astonishing that M. de Lamarck, who hitherto had been studying botany as an amateur, was able so rapidly to qualify himself to produce so extensive a work, in which the rarest plants were described. It is because, from the moment he undertook it, with all the enthusiasm of his nature, he collected them from the gardens and examined them in all the available herbaria; passing the days at the houses of the botanists he knew, but chiefly at the home of M. de Jussieu, in that home where for more than a century a scientific hospitality welcomed with equal kindness every one who was interested in the delightful study of botany.When any one reached Paris with plants he might be sure that the first one who should visit him would be M. de Lamarck; this eager interest was the means of his receiving one of the most valuable presents he could have desired. The celebrated traveller Sonnerat, having returned in 1781 for the second time from the Indies, with very rich collections of natural history, imagined that every one who cultivated this science would flock to him; it was not at Pondichéry or in the Moluccas that he had conceived an idea of the vortex which too often in this capital draws the savants as well as men of the world; no one came but M. de Lamarck, and Sonnerat, in his chagrin, gave him the magnificent collection of plants which he had brought. He profited also by that of Commerson, and by those which had been accumulated by M. de Jussieu, and which were generously opened to him.”

These works were evidently planned and carried out on a broad and comprehensive scale, with originality of treatment, and they were most useful and widely used. Lamarck’s original special botanical papers were numerous. They were mostly descriptive of new species and genera, but some were much broader in scope and were published over a period of ten years, from 1784 to 1794, and appeared in theJournal d’Histoire naturelle, which he founded, and in theMémoiresof the Academy of Sciences.

He discussed the shape or aspect of the plants characteristic of certain countries, while his last botanical effort was on the sensibility of plants (1798).

Although not in the front rank of botanists, compared with Linné, Jussieu, De Candolle, and others, yet during the twenty-six years of his botanical career it may safely be said that Lamarck gave an immenseimpetus to botany in France, and fully earned the title of “the French Linné.”

Lamarck not only described a number of genera and species of plants, but he attempted a general classification, as Cleland states:

“In 1785 (Hist. de l’Acad.) he evinced his appreciation of the necessity of natural orders in botany by an attempt at the classification of plants, interesting though crude, and falling immeasurably short of the system which grew in the hands of his intimate friend Jussieu.”—Encycl. Brit., Art.Lamarck.

A genus of tropical plants of the groupSolanaceæwas namedMarkeaby Richard, in honor of Lamarck, but changed by Persoon and Poiret toLamarckea. The nameLamarckiaof Moench and Koeler was proposed for a genus of grasses; it is nowChrysurus.

Lamarck’s success as a botanist led to more or less intimate relations with Buffon. But it appears that the good-will of this great naturalist and courtier for the rising botanist was not wholly disinterested. Lamarck owed the humble and poorly paid position of keeper of the herbarium to Buffon. Bourguin adds, however:

“Mais il les dut moins à ses mérites qu’aux petits passions de la science officielle.The illustrious Buffon, who was at the same time a very great lord at court, was jealous of Linné. He could not endure having any one compare his brilliant and eloquent word-pictures of animals with the cold and methodical descriptions of the celebrated Swedish naturalist. So he attempted to combat him in another field—botany. For this reason he encouraged and pushed Lamarck into notice, who, as the popularizer of the system ofclassification into natural families, seemed to him to oppose the development of the arrangement of Linné.”

Lamarck’s style was never a highly finished one, and his incipient essays seemed faulty to Buffon, who took so much pains to write all his works in elegant and pure French. So he begged the Abbé Haüy to review the literary form of Lamarck’s works.

Here it might be said that Lamarck’s is the philosophic style; often animated, clear, and pure, it at times, however, becomes prolix and tedious, owing to occasional repetition.

But after all it can easily be understood that the discipline of his botanical studies, the friendship manifested for him by Buffon, then so influential and popular, the relations Lamarck had with Jussieu, Haüy, and the zoölogists of the Jardin du Roi, were all important factors in Lamarck’s success in life, a success not without terrible drawbacks, and to the full fruition of which he did not in his own life attain.

Althoughthere has been and still may be a difference of opinion as to the value and permanency of Lamarck’s theoretical views, there has never been any lack of appreciation of his labors as a systematic zoölogist. He was undoubtedly the greatest zoölogist of his time. Lamarck is the one dominant personage who in the domain of zoölogy filled the interval between Linné and Cuvier, and in acuteness and sound judgment he at times surpassed Cuvier. His was the master mind of the period of systematic zoölogy, which began with Linné—the period which, in the history of zoölogy, preceded that of comparative anatomy and morphology.

After Aristotle, no epoch-making zoölogist arose until Linné was born. In England Linné was preceded by Ray, but binomial nomenclature and the first genuine attempt at the classification of animals dates back to theSystema Naturæof Linné, the tenth edition of which appeared in 1758.

PORTRAIT OF LAMARCKAmbroise Tardieu direxitPORTRAIT OF LAMARCK

Ambroise Tardieu direxit

PORTRAIT OF LAMARCK

The contemporaries of Lamarck in biological science, in the eighteenth century, were Camper (1722–89), Spallanzani (1729–99), Wolff (1733–94), Hunter (1728–93), Bichat (1771–1802), and Vicq d’Azyr (1748–94). These were all anatomists andphysiologists, the last-named being the first to propose and use the term “comparative anatomy,” while Bichat was the founder of histology and pathological anatomy. There was in fact no prominent systematic zoölogist in the interval between Linné and Lamarck. In France there were only two zoölogists of prominence when Lamarck assumed his duties at the Museum. These were Bruguière the conchologist and Olivier the entomologist. In Germany Hermann was the leading systematic zoölogist. We would not forget the labors of the great German anatomist and physiologist Blumenbach, who was also the founder of anthropology; nor the German anatomists Tiedemann, Bojanus, and Carus; nor the embryologist Döllinger. But Lamarck’s method and point of view were of a new order—he was much more than a mere systematist. His work in systematic zoölogy, unlike that of Linné, and especially of Cuvier, was that of a far higher grade. Lamarck, besides his rigid, analytical, thorough, and comprehensive work on the invertebrates, whereby he evolved order and system out of the chaotic mass of forms comprised in the Insects and Vermes of Linné, was animated with conceptions and theories to which his forerunners and contemporaries, Geoffroy St. Hilaire excepted, were entire strangers. His tabular view of the classes of the animal kingdom was to his mind a genealogical tree; his idea of the animal kingdom anticipated and was akin to that of our day. He compares the animal series to a tree with its numerous branches, rather than to a single chain of being. This series, as he expressly states, began with the monad and endedwith man; it began with the simple and ended with the complex, or, as we should now say, it proceeded from the generalized or undifferentiated to the specialized and differentiated. He perceived that many forms had been subjected to what he calls degeneration, or, as we say, modification, and that the progress from the simple to the complex was by no means direct. Moreover, fossil animals were, according to his views, practically extinct species, and stood in the light of being the ancestors of the members of our existing fauna. In fact, his views, notwithstanding shortcomings and errors in classification naturally due to the limited knowledge of anatomy and development of his time, have been at the end of a century entirely confirmed—a striking testimony to his profound insight, sound judgment, and philosophic breadth.

The reforms that he brought about in the classification of the invertebrate animals were direct and positive improvements, were adopted by Cuvier in hisRègne animal, and have never been set aside. We owe to him the foundation and definition of the classes of Infusoria, Annelida, Arachnida, and Crustacea, the two latter groups being separated from the insects. He also showed the distinctness of echinoderms from polyps, thus anticipating Leuckart, who established the phylum of Cœlenterata nearly half a century later. His special work was the classification of the great group of Mollusca, which he regarded as a class. When in our boyhood days we attempted to arrange our shells, we were taught to use the Lamarckian system, that of Linné havingbeen discarded many years previous. The great reforms in the classification of shells are evidenced by the numerous manuals of conchology based on the works of Lamarck.

We used to hear much of the Lamarckian genera of shells, and Lamarck was the first to perceive the necessity of breaking up into smaller categories the few genera of Linné, which now are regarded as families. He may be said to have had a wonderfully good eye for genera. All his generic divisions were at once accepted, since they were based on valid characters.

Though not a comparative anatomist, he at once perceived the value of a knowledge of the internal structure of animals, and made effective use of the discoveries of Cuvier and of his predecessors—in fact, basing his system of classification on the organs of respiration, circulation, and the nervous system.

He intimated that specific characters vary most, and that the peripheral parts of the body, as the shell, outer protective structures, the limbs, mouth-parts, antennæ, etc., are first affected by the causes which produce variation, while he distinctly states that it requires a longer time for variations to take place in the internal organs. On the latter he relied in defining his classes.

One is curious to know how Lamarck viewed the question of species. This is discussed at length by him in his general essays, which are reproduced farther on in this biography, but his definition of what a species is far surpasses in breadth andterseness, and better satisfies the views now prevailing, than that of any other author.

His definition of a species is as follows:

“Every collection of similar individuals, perpetuated by generation in the same condition, so long as the circumstances of their situation do not change enough to produce variations in their habits, character, and form.”

Lamarck’s rare skill, thoroughness, and acuteness as an observer, combined with great breadth of view, were also supplemented by the advantages arising from residence in Paris, and his connection with the Museum of Natural History. Paris was in the opening years of the nineteenth century the chief centre of biological science. France having convalesced from the intestinal disorders of the Revolution, and, as the result of her foreign wars, adding to her territory and power, had begun with the strength of a young giant to send out those splendid exploring expeditions which gathered in collections in natural history from all parts of the known or accessible world, and poured them, as it were, into the laps of the professors of the Jardin des Plantes. The shelves and cases of the galleries fairly groaned with the weight of the zoölogical riches which crowded them. From the year 1800 to 1832 the French government showed the greatest activity in sending out exploring expeditions to Egypt, Africa, and the tropics.[119]

The zoölogists who explored Egypt were Geoffroy St. Hilaire and Savigny. Those who visited the East, the South Seas, the East Indian archipelago, and other regions were Bruguière, Olivier, Bory de St. Vincent, Péron, Lesueur, Quoy, Gaimard, Le Vaillant, Edoux, and Souleyet. The natural result was the enormous collections of the Jardin des Plantes, and consequently enlarged views regarding the number and distribution of species, and their relation to their environment.

In Paris, about the time of Lamarck’s death, flourished also Savigny, who published his immortal works on the morphology of arthropods and of ascidians; and Straus-Durckheim, whose splendidly illustrated volumes on the anatomy of the cockchafer and of the cat will never cease to be of value; and É. Geoffroy St. Hilaire, whose elaborate and classical works on vertebrate morphology, embryology, and comparative anatomy added so much to the prestige of French science.

We may be sure that Lamarck did his own work without help from others, and gave full credit to those who, like Defrance or Bruguière, aided or immediately preceded him. He probably was lacking in executive force, or in the art which Cuvier knew so well to practise, of enlisting young men to do thedrudgery or render material aid, and then, in some cases, neglecting to give them proper credit.

The first memoir or paper published on a zoölogical subject by Lamarck was a modest one on shells, which appeared in 1792 in theJournal d’Histoire naturelle, the editors of which were Lamarck, Bruguière, Olivier, Haüy, and Pelletier. This paper was a review of an excellent memoir by Bruguière, who preceded Lamarck in the work of dismemberment of the Linnæan genera. His next paper was on four new species of Helix. To thisJournal, of which only two volumes were published, Cuvier contributed his first paper—namely, on some new species of “Cloportes” (Oniscus, a genus of terrestrial crustacea or “pill-bugs”); this was followed by his second memoir on the anatomy of the limpet, his next article being descriptions of two species of flies from his collection of insects.[120]Seven years later Lamarckgave some account of the genera of cuttlefishes. His first general memoir was a prodromus of a new classification of shells (1799).

Meanwhile Lamarck’s knowledge of shells and corals was utilized by Cuvier in hisTableau élémentaire, published in 1798, who acknowledges in the preface that in the exposition of the genera of shells he has been powerfully seconded, while he indicated to him (Cuvier) a part of the subgenera of corals and alcyonarians, and adds, “I have received great aid from the examination of his collection.” Also he acknowledges that he had been greatly aided (puissamment secondé) by Lamarck, who had even indicated the most of the subdivisions established in hisTableau élémentairefor the insects (Blainville,l. c., p. 129), and he also accepted his genera of cuttlefishes.

After this Lamarck judiciously refrained from publishing descriptions of new species, and other fragmentary labors, and for some ten years from the date of publication of his first zoölogical article reserved his strength and elaborated his first general zoölogical work, a thick octavo volume of 452 pages, entitledSystème des Animaux sans Vertèbres, which appeared in 1801.

Linné had divided all the animals below the vertebrates into two classes only, the Insecta and Vermes, the insects comprising the present classes of insects, Myriapoda, Arachnida, and Crustacea; the Vermes embracing all the other invertebrate animals, from the molluscs to the monads.

Lamarck perceived the need of reform, of bringing order out of the chaotic mass of animal forms, and he says (p. 33) that he has been continually occupied since his attachment to the museum with this reform.

He relies for his characters, the fundamental ones, on the organs of respiration, circulation, and on the form of the nervous system. The reasons he gives for his classification are sound and philosophical, and presented with the ease and aplomb of a master of taxonomy.

He divided the invertebrates, which Cuvier had called animals with white blood, into the seven following classes.

We place in a parallel column the classification of Cuvier in 1798.

Of these, four were for the first time defined, and the others restricted. It will be noticed that he separates the Radiata (Radiaires) from the Polypes. His“Radiaires” included the Echinoderms (theVers echinodermsof Bruguière) and the Medusæ (hisRadiaires molasses), the latter forming the Discophora and Siphonophora of present zoölogists. This is an anticipation of the division by Leuckart in 1839 of the Radiata of Cuvier into Cœlenterata and Echinodermata.

The “Polypes” of Lamarck included not only the forms now known as such, but also the Rotifera and Protozoa, though, as we shall see, he afterwards in his course of 1807 eliminated from this heterogeneous assemblage the Infusoria.

Comparing this classification with that of Cuvier[121]published in 1798, we find that in the most important respects,i.e., the foundation of the classes of Crustacea, Arachnida, and Radiata, there is a great advance over Cuvier’s system. In Cuvier’s work the molluscs are separated from the worms, and they are divided into three groups, Cephalopodes, Gasteropodes, and Acephales—an arrangement which still holds, that of Lamarck into Mollusques céphalés and Mollusques acéphalés being much less natural. With the elimination of the Mollusca, Cuvier allowed the Vers or Vermes of Linné to remain undisturbed, except that the Zoöphytes, the equivalent of Lamarck’s Polypes, are separately treated.

He agrees with Cuvier in placing the molluscs at the head of the invertebrates, a course still pursued by some zoölogists at the present day. He states in thePhilosophie Zoologique[122]that in his course oflectures of the year 1799 he established the class of Crustacea, and adds that “although this class is essentially distinct, it was not until six or seven years after that some naturalists consented to adopt it.” The year following, or in his course of 1800, he separated from the insects the class of Arachnida, as “easy and necessary to be distinguished.” But in 1809 he says that this class “is not yet admitted into any other work than my own.”[123]As to the class of Annelides, he remarks: “Cuvier having discovered the existence of arterial and venous vessels in different animals which have been confounded under the name of worms (Vers) with other animals very differently organized, I immediately employed the consideration of this new fact in rendering my classification more perfect, and in my course of the year 10 (1802) I established the class of Annelides, a class which I have placed after the molluscs and before the crustaceans, as their known organization requires.” He first established this class in hisRecherches sur les corps vivans(1802), but it was several years before it was adopted by naturalists.

The next work in which Lamarck deals with the classification of the invertebrates is hisDiscours d’ouverture du Cours des Animaux sans Vertèbres, published in 1806.

On page 70 he speaks of the animal chain or series, from the monad to man, ascending from the most simple to the most complex. The monad is one of hisPolypes amorphs, and he says that it is the most simple animal form, the most like the original germ (ébauche) from which living bodies have descended. From the monad nature passes to the Volvox, Proteus (Amœba), and Vibrio. From them are derived thePolypes rotifèresand other “Radiaires,” and then the Vers, Arachnides, and Crustacea. On page 77 a tabular view is presented, as follows:

It will be seen that at this date two additional classes are proposed and defined—i.e., the Annelides and the Cirrhipedes, though the class of Annelida was first privately characterized in his lectures for 1802.

The elimination of the barnacles or Cirrhipedes from the molluscs was a decided step in advance, and was a proof of the acute observation and sound judgment of Lamarck. He says that this class is still very imperfectly known and its position doubtful, and adds: “The Cirrhipedes have up to the present time been placed among the molluscs, but althoughcertain of them closely approach them in some respects, they have a special character which compels us to separate them. In short, in the genera best known the feet of these animals are distinctly articulated and even crustaceous (crustacés).” He does not refer to the nervous system, but this is done in his next work. It will be remembered that Cuvier overlooked this feature of the jointed limbs, and also the crustaceous-like nervous system of the barnacles, and allowed them to remain among the molluscs, notwithstanding the decisive step taken by Lamarck. It was not until many years after (1830) that Thompson proved by their life-history that barnacles are true crustacea.

In thePhilosophie zoologiquethe ten classes of the invertebrates are arranged in the following order:

At the end of the second volume Lamarck gives a tabular view on a page by itself (p. 463), showing his conception of the origin of the different groups of animals. This is the first phylogeny or genealogical tree ever published.

At the top, Infusoires, Polypes and Radiares. Beside, Vers. From Vers, two groups of 3: Insectes, Arachnides and Crustacés; and Annelides, Cirrhipèdes and Mollusques. From the latter, Poissons and Reptiles. From those, Oiseaux, and then Monotrèmes. Also from Reptiles, M. Amphibies. From there, separate branches to M. Cétacés, M. Ongulés, and M. Onguiculés.

The next innovation made by Lamarck in theExtrait du Cours de Zoologie, in 1812, was not a happy one. In this work he distributed the fourteen classes of the animal kingdom into three groups, which he namedAnimaux Apathiques,Sensibles, andIntelligens. In this physiologico-psychological base for a classification he unwisely departed from his usual more solid foundation of anatomical structure, and the results were worthless. He, however, repeats it in his great work,Histoire naturelle des Animaux sans Vertèbres(1815–1822).

The sponges were by Cuvier, and also by Lamarck, accorded a position among the Polypes, near Alcyonium, which represents the latter’sPolypiers empâtés; and it is interesting to notice that, for many years remaining among the Protozoa, meanwhile even by Agassiz regarded as vegetables, they were by Haeckel restored to a position among the Cœlenterates, though for over twenty years they have by some American zoölogists been more correctly regarded as a separate phylum.[124]Lamarck also separated the seals and morses from the cetacea. Adopting his idea, Cuvier referred the seals to an order of carnivora.

Another interesting matter, to which Professor Lacaze-Duthiers has called attention in his interesting letter on p. 77, is the position assignedLucernariaamong hisRadiaires molassesnear what are now Ctenophora and Medusæ, though one would havesupposed he would, from its superficial resemblance to polyps, have placed it among the polyps. To Lamarck we are also indebted for the establishment in 1818 of the molluscan group of Heteropoda.

Lamarck’s acuteness is also shown in the fact that, whereas Cuvier placed them among the acephalous molluscs, he did not regard the ascidians as molluscs at all, but places them in a class by themselves under the name ofTunicata, following the Sipunculus worms. Yet he allowed them to remain near the Holothurians (then including Sipunculus) in his group ofRadiaires echinodermes, between the latter and the Vers. He differs from Cuvier in regarding the tunic as the homologue of the shell of Lamellibranches, remarking that it differs in being muscular and contractile.

Lamarck’s fame as a zoölogist rests chiefly on this great work. It elicited the highest praise from his contemporaries. Besides containing the innovations made in the classification of the animal kingdom, which he had published in previous works, it was a summary of all which was then known of the invertebrate classes, thus forming a most convenient hand-book, since it mentioned all the known genera and all the known species except those of the insects, of which only the types are mentioned. It passed through two editions, and still is not without value to the working systematist.

In hisHistoire des Progrès des Sciences naturellesCuvier does it justice. Referring to the earlier volume, he states that “it has extended immensely the knowledge, especially by a new distribution, of the shelledmolluscs ... M. de Lamarck has established with as much care as sagacity the genera of shells.” Again he says, in noticing the three first volumes: “The great detail into which M. de Lamarck has entered, the new species he has described, renders his work very valuable to naturalists, and renders most desirable its prompt continuation, especially from the knowledge we have of means which this experienced professor possesses to carry to a high degree of perfection the enumeration which he will give us of the shells” (Œuvres complètes de Buffon, 1828, t. 31, p. 354).

“His excellences,” says Cleland, speaking of Lamarck as a scientific observer, “were width of scope, fertility of ideas, and a preëminent faculty of precise description, arising not only from a singularly terse style, but from a clear insight into both the distinctive features and the resemblance of forms” (Encyc. Britannica, Art.Lamarck).

The work, moreover, is remarkable for being the first one to begin with the simplest and to end with the most highly developed forms.

Lamarck’s special line of study was the Mollusca. How his work is still regarded by malacologists is shown by the following letter from our leading student of molluscs, Dr. W. H. Dall:

“Smithsonian Institution,“United States National Museum,Washington, D. C.,“November 4, 1899.“Lamarck was one of the best naturalists of his time, when geniuses abounded. His work was the first well-marked step toward a natural system as opposed to the formalities of Linné. He owedsomething to Cuvier, yet he knew how to utilize the work in anatomy offered by Cuvier in making a natural classification. His failing eyesight, which obliged him latterly to trust to the eyes of others; his poverty and trials of various kinds, more than excuse the occasional slips which we find in some of the later volumes of theAnimaux sans Vertèbres. These are rather of the character of typographical errors than faults of scheme or principle.“The work of Lamarck is really the foundation of rational natural malacological classification; practically all that came before his time was artificial in comparison. Work that came later was in the line of expansion and elaboration of Lamarck’s, without any change of principle. Only with the application of embryology and microscopical work of the most modern type has there come any essential change of method, and this is rather a new method of getting at the facts than any fundamental change in the way of using them when found. I shall await your work on Lamarck’s biography with great interest.“I remain,“Yours sincerely,“William H. Dall.”

“Smithsonian Institution,“United States National Museum,Washington, D. C.,“November 4, 1899.

“Lamarck was one of the best naturalists of his time, when geniuses abounded. His work was the first well-marked step toward a natural system as opposed to the formalities of Linné. He owedsomething to Cuvier, yet he knew how to utilize the work in anatomy offered by Cuvier in making a natural classification. His failing eyesight, which obliged him latterly to trust to the eyes of others; his poverty and trials of various kinds, more than excuse the occasional slips which we find in some of the later volumes of theAnimaux sans Vertèbres. These are rather of the character of typographical errors than faults of scheme or principle.

“The work of Lamarck is really the foundation of rational natural malacological classification; practically all that came before his time was artificial in comparison. Work that came later was in the line of expansion and elaboration of Lamarck’s, without any change of principle. Only with the application of embryology and microscopical work of the most modern type has there come any essential change of method, and this is rather a new method of getting at the facts than any fundamental change in the way of using them when found. I shall await your work on Lamarck’s biography with great interest.

“I remain,“Yours sincerely,“William H. Dall.”

FOOTNOTES:[119]During the same period (1803–1829) Russia sent out expeditions to the North and Northeast, accompanied by the zoölogists Tilesius, Langsdorff, Chamisso, Eschscholtz, and Brandt, all of them of German birth and education. From 1823 to 1850 England fitted up and sent out exploring expeditions commanded by Beechey, Fitzroy, Belcher, Ross, Franklin, and Stanley, the naturalists of which were Bennett, Owen, Darwin, Adams, and Huxley. From Germany, less of a maritime country, at a later date, Humboldt, Spix, PrinceWied-Neuwied, Natterer, Perty, and others made memorable exploring expeditions and journeys.[120]These papers have been mercilessly criticised by Blainville in his “Cuvier et Geoffroy St. Hilaire.” In the second article—i.e., on the anatomy of the limpet—Cuvier, in considering the organs, follows no definite plan; he gives a description “tout-a-fait fantastique” of the muscular fibres of the foot, and among other errors in this first essay on comparative anatomy he mistakes the tongue for the intromittent organ; the salivary glands, and what is probably part of the brain, being regarded as the testes, with other “erreurs matérielles inconcevables, même à l’époque ou elle fut rédigée.” In his first article he mistakes a species of the myriapod genus Glomeris for the isopod genus Armadillo. In this he is corrected by the editor (possibly Lamarck himself), who remarks in a footnote that the forms to which M. Cuvier refers under the name of Armadillo are veritable species of Julus. We have verified these criticisms of Cuvier by reference to his papers in the “Journal.” It is of interest to note, as Blainville does, that Cuvier at this period admits that there is a passage from the Isopoda to the armadilloes and Julus. Cuvier, then twenty-three years old, wrote: “Nous sommes donc descendus par degrès, des Écrevisses aux Squilles, de celles-ci aux Aselles, puis aux Cloportes, aux Armadilles et aux Ïules” (Journal d’Hist. nat., tom. ii., p. 29, 1792). These errors, as regards the limpet, were afterwards corrected by Cuvier (though he does not refer to his original papers) in hisMémoires pour servir à l’Histoire et à l’Anatomie des Mollusques(1817).[121]Tableau élémentaire de l’Histoire naturelle des Animaux.Paris, An VI. (1798). 8vo, pp. 710. With 14 plates.[122]Tome i., p. 123.[123]In hisHistoire des Progrès des Sciences naturellesCuvier takes to himself part of the credit of founding the class Crustacea, stating that Aristotle had already placed them in a class by themselves, and adding, “MM. Cuvier et de Lamarck les en out distingués par des caractères de premier ordre tirés de leur circulation.” Undoubtedly Cuvier described the circulation, but it was Lamarck who actually realized the taxonomic importance of this feature and placed them in a distinct class.[124]See A. Hyatt’sRevision of North American Poriferæ, Part II. (Boston, 1877, p. 11); also the present writer in hisText-book of Zoölogy(1878).

[119]During the same period (1803–1829) Russia sent out expeditions to the North and Northeast, accompanied by the zoölogists Tilesius, Langsdorff, Chamisso, Eschscholtz, and Brandt, all of them of German birth and education. From 1823 to 1850 England fitted up and sent out exploring expeditions commanded by Beechey, Fitzroy, Belcher, Ross, Franklin, and Stanley, the naturalists of which were Bennett, Owen, Darwin, Adams, and Huxley. From Germany, less of a maritime country, at a later date, Humboldt, Spix, PrinceWied-Neuwied, Natterer, Perty, and others made memorable exploring expeditions and journeys.

[120]These papers have been mercilessly criticised by Blainville in his “Cuvier et Geoffroy St. Hilaire.” In the second article—i.e., on the anatomy of the limpet—Cuvier, in considering the organs, follows no definite plan; he gives a description “tout-a-fait fantastique” of the muscular fibres of the foot, and among other errors in this first essay on comparative anatomy he mistakes the tongue for the intromittent organ; the salivary glands, and what is probably part of the brain, being regarded as the testes, with other “erreurs matérielles inconcevables, même à l’époque ou elle fut rédigée.” In his first article he mistakes a species of the myriapod genus Glomeris for the isopod genus Armadillo. In this he is corrected by the editor (possibly Lamarck himself), who remarks in a footnote that the forms to which M. Cuvier refers under the name of Armadillo are veritable species of Julus. We have verified these criticisms of Cuvier by reference to his papers in the “Journal.” It is of interest to note, as Blainville does, that Cuvier at this period admits that there is a passage from the Isopoda to the armadilloes and Julus. Cuvier, then twenty-three years old, wrote: “Nous sommes donc descendus par degrès, des Écrevisses aux Squilles, de celles-ci aux Aselles, puis aux Cloportes, aux Armadilles et aux Ïules” (Journal d’Hist. nat., tom. ii., p. 29, 1792). These errors, as regards the limpet, were afterwards corrected by Cuvier (though he does not refer to his original papers) in hisMémoires pour servir à l’Histoire et à l’Anatomie des Mollusques(1817).

[121]Tableau élémentaire de l’Histoire naturelle des Animaux.Paris, An VI. (1798). 8vo, pp. 710. With 14 plates.

[122]Tome i., p. 123.

[123]In hisHistoire des Progrès des Sciences naturellesCuvier takes to himself part of the credit of founding the class Crustacea, stating that Aristotle had already placed them in a class by themselves, and adding, “MM. Cuvier et de Lamarck les en out distingués par des caractères de premier ordre tirés de leur circulation.” Undoubtedly Cuvier described the circulation, but it was Lamarck who actually realized the taxonomic importance of this feature and placed them in a distinct class.

[124]See A. Hyatt’sRevision of North American Poriferæ, Part II. (Boston, 1877, p. 11); also the present writer in hisText-book of Zoölogy(1878).

Ofthe French precursors of Lamarck there were four—Duret (1609), De Maillet (1748), Robinet (1768), and Buffon. The opinions of the first three could hardly be taken seriously, as they were crude and fantastic, though involving the idea of descent. The suggestions and hypotheses of Buffon and of Erasmus Darwin were of quite a different order, and deserve careful consideration.

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