for the consideration of its members, and through the instrumentality of
a committee of working naturalists an excellent code of regulations and
suggestions on the subject of zoological nomenclature was drawn up in
1842. These rules were revised and reprinted in 1865; and in accordance
with a resolution adopted at the last annual meeting at Plymouth they
have been again republished at the cost of the Association during the
present year. The mere issue of such rules must have had a beneficial
effect, as they have undoubtedly been a guide to many careful and
conscientious workers. Unfortunately no means exist of enforcing them
upon those of a different class, but there is still something wanting,
short of enforcing them, which possibly may be within the power of the
Association to effect. In the administration of the judicial affairs of
a nation, besides the makers of the laws, we have an equally essential
body to interpret or apply the law to particular cases--the judges.
However carefully compiled or excellent a code of regulations may be,
dubious and difficult cases will arise, to which the application of the
law is not always clear, and about which individual opinions will
differ. The necessary permission given in the Association rules to
change names which are either “glaringly false,” or “not clearly
defined,” opens the door to considerable latitude of private
interpretation. As what we are aiming at is simply convenience and
general accord, and not absolute justice or truth, there are also cases
in which the rigid law of priority, even if it can be ascertained,
requires qualification, and others in which it may be advisable to put
up with a small error or inconvenience to avoid falling into a larger
one. I may name such cases as the propriety or the reverse of reviving
an obselete or almost unknown name for one which, if not strictly
legitimate, has been universally accepted, or the retention of a name
when already applied to a different genus, instead of the institution of
another in its place. For instance, should the name _Echidna_, by which
the well-known Monotrematous Mammal is known in every text-book and
catalogue in every language, be superseded by _Tachyglossus_, because
the former name had previously been applied to a genus of snakes? or
should the chimpanzee be no longer called _Troglodytes_ lest it should
be confounded with a wren? Should _Chiromys_ be discarded for
_Daubentonia_, _Trichechus_ for _Odobenus_, and _Tapirus_ for
_Hydrochœrus_? Should the Java slow lemur be called _Loris_, _Stenops_,
or _Nycticebus_? Should Sowerby’s whale be placed in the genus
_Physeter_, _Delphinus_, _Delphinorhynchus_, _Heterodon_, _Diodon_,
_Aodon_, _Nodus_, _Ziphius_, _Micropterus_, _Micropteron_, _Mesodiodon_,
_Dioplodon_, or _Mesoplodon_, in all of which it may be found in various
systematic lists? Should one of the largest and best known of the
Cetaceans of our seas be called _Balænoptera musculus_, _Physalus
antiquorum_, or _Pterobalæna communis_, all names used for it by authors
of high authority? Should the smallest British seal be called _Phoca
hispida_, _fœtida_, or _anellata_?
I might go on indefinitely multiplying instances which will be answered
differently by different naturalists, the arguments for one or the other
name being often nicely balanced. What is wanted, therefore, is some
kind of judicial authority for deciding which should in future be used.
If a committee of eminent naturalists, selected from various nations,
and divided into several sections, according to the subjects with which
each member is most familiar, could be prevailed upon to take up the
task of revising the whole of our existing nomenclature upon the basis
of the laws issued by the Association in 1842, occasionally tempering
their strictly legal decisions with a little discretion and common
sense, and with a view, as much as possible, of avoiding confusion and
promoting general convenience,--and if the working zoologists of the
world generally would agree to accept the decisions of such a committee
as final,--we should dispose of many of the difficulties with which we
are now troubled. There seems to me no more reason why the nomenclature
of such a committee, if it were composed of men in whose judgment their
fellow-workers would have confidence, should not be as universally
accepted as is the nomenclature of the last edition of the _Systema
Naturæ_ of Linnæus. We have agreed not to look beyond that work for
evidence of priority, and why should we not agree in the same way to
accept decisions which would probably be arrived at with even fuller
knowledge and greater sense of responsibility?
Whether this suggestion will be received with favour or not, it appeared
to me that it was one not inappropriate for the consideration of this
Section, which has already dealt with the question in a manner so
advantageous to science, and also for this year, which has witnessed the
hundredth anniversary of the death of the great teacher of systematic
zoology.
Our knowledge of the living inhabitants of the earth has indeed changed
since that time. Our views of their relations to the universe, to each
other, and to ourselves, have undergone great revolutions. The knowledge
of Linnæus far surpassed that of any of his contemporaries; but yet of
what we now know he knew but an infinitesimal amount. Much that he
thought he knew we now deem false. Nevertheless, some of the oldest
words to be found in all his writings contain sentiments which still
claim a response in the hearts of many. Although we are less accustomed
to see such words in works of science, that is no proof that their
significance has been impaired by the marvellous progress of knowledge.
With the words which Linnæus selected to place at the head of his great
work I will conclude--
_O Jehova,_
_Quam ampla sunt tua opera!_
_Quam sapienter ea fecisti!_
_Quam plena est terra possessione tua!_
XIII
THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON[32]
Nowhere has the progress which the world has made during the fifty years
of Her Majesty’s reign, the completion of which we are now happily
celebrating, been more strikingly manifested than in the advance of that
so-called “natural knowledge” for the improvement of which our Royal
Society was instituted more than two centuries ago. Although there have
been, without doubt, immense strides in other directions--in morals, in
art, in historical and literary criticism--I venture to say that none of
these can be compared with the marvellous progress that has been made in
scientific knowledge and scientific methods.
The tangible results that have followed the practical applications of
mechanics, physics, and chemistry have so deeply affected the material
interests of mankind, that the progress of these branches of knowledge
may seem to put into the shade the wonderful changes that have taken
place in the kindred sciences. Nevertheless, I think we may safely say
that Zoology, in a certain sense one of the oldest of human studies, has
in these latter times undergone a new birth, which has not only changed
the standpoint from which we view the special objects of our studies,
but has also spread its influence far and wide, and profoundly modified
our conceptions on many questions at first sight entirely remote from
its sphere. The universal abandonment of the doctrine of fixity of
species, which was an article of faith with almost every zoologist in
1837, has introduced new interests, as well, it must be confessed, as
new difficulties, the extent of which we are only beginning to
appreciate. The definite systems of classification and methods of
nomenclature on which our fathers relied utterly fail before the wider
field of vision which it is the privilege, as well as the embarrassment,
of the present generation of zoologists to realise.
But it is no part of my intention, in the brief space of time for which
I shall ask your patience, to attempt to give a history of the recent
advances of zoological science in general, but only, as requested by
your Council, to say a few words on the progress of the particular
Institution established for its cultivation in which we are personally
interested, and the duration of which is so nearly contemporaneous with
that of Her Majesty’s reign.
Before this Society was founded there was no distinct organisation in
the country devoted solely to collecting, recording, and discussing the
facts upon which zoological science rests. The dignified parent of all
our scientific societies, the _Royal_, certainly undertook, as it does
still, the discussion of many zoological subjects; but it could not be
expected to treat them in any detail. The Linnæan was a society of great
respectability, devoted solely to biological research, both zoological
and botanical, already nearly forty years of age, and possessed of all
the usual appurtenances of a scientific organisation--meetings, library,
and collections for reference. I cannot help thinking that if its
leading Fellows had, at that time, displayed more energy, it might have
kept in its hands the principal direction of the biological studies of
the country, instead of allowing what has since proved so formidable a
rival to spring up, and to absorb so large a portion of its useful
functions. However, for reasons which it is perhaps not worth while to
inquire into now, it did not supply all the needs of the lovers of
Zoology; and in the year 1826 an active and zealous band united
together, and, as the Charter tells us, “subscribed and expended
considerable sums of money for the purpose” of founding the _Zoological
Society of London_.
The leading spirit of this band was Sir Stamford Raffles, then just
returned from the administration of those Eastern islands of which the
history, both natural and political, will ever be intimately associated
with his name. He was chosen for the office of President, but his death,
on the 5th of July 1826, deprived the Society, while yet in its infancy,
of his valuable services even some years before it acquired its Charter
of Incorporation. In this deed, dated 27th March 1829, Henry, Marquis of
Lansdowne, is named as the first President of the chartered Society,
Joseph Sabine as the first Treasurer, and Nicholas Aylward Vigors the
first Secretary.
The Society appears to have acquired great popularity in a surprisingly
short time. The first printed list of members that I can discover (dated
1st January 1829) contains the names of 1294 ordinary Fellows and 40
honorary and corresponding members. The list is an interesting one, from
the number of names it includes of persons eminent either in science,
art, literature, politics, or social life; indeed, there were not many
people of distinction in the country at that time who are not to be
found in it.
A piece of ground in the Regent’s Park having been obtained from the
Government at little more than a nominal rent, the Gardens were laid
out, and opened in 1828, during which year 98,605 visitors are recorded
as having entered. In the following (the first complete) year there were
as many as 189,913 visitors, and this number was increased in 1831 to
262,193.
While the menagerie of living animals was being formed in the Regent’s
Park, the Officers and Fellows of the Society were also engaged in
establishing a museum of preserved specimens, which soon assumed very
considerable dimensions. A catalogue printed as early as the year 1828
contains a classified list of 450 specimens of Mammalia alone; and it
continued for many years to attract donations from travellers and
collectors in all parts of the world, and became of great scientific
importance, inasmuch as it contained very many types of species
described for the first time in the publications of the Society. It was
at first lodged in rooms in the society’s house in Bruton Street; but
these becoming so crowded as to present the “confused air of a store
rather than the appearance of an arranged museum,” premises were taken
in 1836 in Leicester Square, the same which were formerly occupied by
the museum of John Hunter before its removal to the College of Surgeons.
At this time the museum is reported to have contained as many as 6720
specimens of vertebrated animals, and numerous additions were still
being made both by donations and by purchase. The rooms in Leicester
Square being found inconvenient for the purpose, it was finally
resolved, after considerable discussion of various sites, to transfer
the collection to the Gardens in the Regent’s Park; and in 1843 the
building which is now occupied as a lecture-room on the upper floor and
a storeroom below was constructed and fitted up for its reception.
Although the museum was at one time looked upon as a very important part
of the Society’s operations, being spoken of as “the centre of the
Society’s scientific usefulness” (Report of Council, 1837), and one upon
which considerable sums of money were spent, it was afterwards a cause
of embarrassment, from the difficulty and expense of keeping it up in a
state of efficiency; and when the Zoological Department of the British
Museum acquired such a development as to fulfil all the objects proposed
by the Society’s collection, the uselessness of endeavouring to maintain
a second and inferior zoological museum in the same city became
apparent, and in 1856 it was, as I think very wisely, determined to part
with the collection, the whole of the types being transferred to the
National Museum, and the remaining specimens to other institutions,
where it was thought their value would be most appreciated.
Another enterprise in which the Fellows of the Society were much
interested in its early days was the farm at Kingston, the special
object of which was thus defined: “It will be useful in receiving
animals which may require a greater range and more quiet than the
Gardens at the Regent’s Park can afford. It is absolutely necessary for
the purpose of breeding and rearing young animals and giving facilities
for observations on matters of physiological interest and research, and,
above all, in making attempts to naturalise such species as are hitherto
rare or unknown in this country.” The farm, however, apparently not
fulfilling the objects expected of it, and being a source of expense
which the Society could not then well afford, was gradually allowed to
fall into neglect, and finally abandoned in 1834.
The mention of this establishment, however, causes me to allude to one
of the objects on which the Society laid considerable stress at its
foundation, and which is defined in the Charter as “the introduction of
new and curious subjects of the Animal Kingdom,” but which, as may be
gathered from the Annual Reports of the Council and from other
documents, meant not only the temporary introduction of individuals for
the purpose of satisfying curiosity about their external characters and
structure, but also the permanent domestication of foreign animals which
might become of value to man, either for their utility in adding to our
food-supplies or for the pleasure they afford by their beauty.
Abundant illustrations of the vanity of human expectations are afforded
by the details of the hopes and disappointments recorded in the reports
of the Society relating to this subject. It is mentioned in the report
of the year 1832 that “the armadillo has three times produced young, and
hopes are entertained of this animal, so valuable as an article of food,
being naturalised in this country.” More than fifty years have passed,
and British-grown armadillo has not yet appeared upon the menu-cards of
our dinner-tables. At one time the South American curassows and guans
were confidently looked upon as future rivals to our barn-door fowls and
turkeys. Various species of pheasants and other game birds from Northern
India, collected and imported at great expense, were to add zest and
variety to the battue of the English sportsman. The great success which
for many years attended the breeding of giraffes in the Gardens not
unnaturally led to the expectation that these beautiful creatures might
become denizens of our parks, or at all events a source of continued
profit to the Society; and it is possible that some who are here now may
have been present at the feast, for which an eland was sacrificed, amid
loudly-uttered prognostications that the ready acclimatisation of these
animals would result, if not in superseding, at least in providing a
change from our monotonous round of mutton, beef, and pork.
Unfortunately for these anticipations, no giraffe has been born in the
Gardens during the last twenty years, and elands are still far too
scarce to be killed for food of man in England.
It is well that these experiments should have been tried; it may be
well, perhaps, that some of them should be tried again when favourable
opportunities occur; but it is also well that we should recognise the
almost insuperable difficulties that must attend the attempt to
introduce a new animal able to compete in useful qualities with those
which, as is the case of all of our limited number of domestic animals,
have gradually acquired the peculiarities making them valuable to man,
by the accumulation of slight improvements through countless generations
of ancestors. While all our pressing wants are so well supplied by the
animals we already possess, it can no longer pay to begin again at the
beginning with a new species. This appears to be the solution of the
singular fact, scarcely sufficiently appreciated, that no addition of
any practical importance has been made to our stock of truly domestic
animals since the commencement of the historic period of man’s life upon
earth.
I now turn to the history of one of the most important features of the
Society, the scientific meetings. In the early days of the Society there
was only one class of general meetings for business of all kinds; and
the exhibition of specimens and the communication of notices on subjects
of zoological interest formed part of the ordinary proceedings at those
meetings. The great extent, however, of the general business was soon
found to interfere with such an arrangement. The number of the elections
and of the recommendations of candidates, the reports on the progress of
the Society in its several branches during each month, and other
business, were found to require so much time as to leave little for
scientific communications, and the Council saw with regret that these
were frequently and necessarily postponed to matters of more pressing
but less permanent interest. To obviate this inconvenience and to afford
opportunities for the reception and discussion of communications upon
zoological subjects, the Council had recourse to the institution of a
“Committee of Science and Correspondence,” composed of such members of
the Society as had principally applied themselves to science,--at the
meetings of which communications upon zoological subjects might be
received and discussed, and occasional selections made for the purpose
of publication.
The first meeting of the Committee took place on the evening of Tuesday,
9th November 1830, at the Society’s house in Bruton Street, when a
communication was received upon the anatomy of the uran-utan by a young
and then unknown naturalist, Richard Owen by name. This was the first of
that long series of memoirs, extending over a period of more than fifty
years, the publication of which in our _Transactions_ has done so much
to advance the knowledge of comparative anatomy and to give an
illustrious place to their author in the annals of science.
Among the names of others who are mentioned as having taken part in the
business of the Committee during the first year of its existence, either
by their actual presence or by forwarding communications, are N. A.
Vigors, W. Yarrell, J. E. Gray, J. Gould, E. T. Bennett, Andrew Smith,
Bryan H. Hodgson,[33] T. Bell, W. Martin, Joshua Brookes, W. Kirby, W.
H. Sykes, Marshall Hall, W. Ogilby, and John Richardson.
The Committee continued in existence for two years, having met for the
last time on 11th December 1832. The success of its meetings was so
great that it was thought desirable to make an alteration in the
by-laws, by which the meetings of the Committee were replaced by the
“General Meetings of the Society for Scientific Business.” The first of
these meetings took place on Tuesday, the 8th of January 1833, and they
have continued to be held on two Tuesdays in each month during the
season to the present time. As long as the Society retained its house in
Bruton Street, the meetings were held there. In 1843 the Society took
another house, which it occupied for forty-one years, No. 11 Hanover
Square; but its needs having outgrown the accommodation afforded there,
it removed in 1884 to the far more spacious and commodious premises in
No. 3 of the same square, which we at present occupy. These meetings of
the Society, which are open to all the Fellows and to friends
introduced by them, have exercised a considerable influence upon the
progress of zoological knowledge, not only by the reading and discussing
of communications formally brought before them, but also by the
interchange of ideas at the informal social gatherings over the
coffee-table in the Library afterwards, which have great value as
affording a common meeting-ground and bond of union for all the working
zoologists of the country, as well as for many visitors from foreign
lands.
The more important scientific communications to these meetings have from
the commencement been published in the form of quarto _Transactions_ and
octavo _Proceedings_, which constitute a series of inestimable
importance both for the value of the material contained in them and for
the excellence of the illustrations of new or rare forms of animal life
with which they are embellished. In later times they have also formed a
vehicle for communicating to the world the important results obtained
from the dissection of animals which have died at the Gardens, and
which, since the establishment of the office of Prosector in 1865, have
been systematically used for this purpose.
In connection with the scientific meetings must be mentioned the
Library, the first formation of which is described in the report of the
Council for the year 1837, and which has been steadily growing ever
since by donations of books, by exchange of publications with other
learned Societies, and by judicious annual expenditure of money, until
it has become one of the best-selected, well-arranged, and most
accessible collection of works of reference that it is possible for the
zoological student to enjoy. Its value has been greatly increased by the
publication within the past month of an excellent catalogue, which
contains the titles of about 6560 works.
The most recent addition to the functions that the Society has
undertaken with a view to carry out the purposes of its foundation is
the publication of an Annual Record of Zoological Literature, containing
a summary of the work done by British and Foreign naturalists in the
various branches of Zoology in each year, a publication of the utmost
value to the working zoologist. Such a Record has been carried on for
some years past by a voluntary association of naturalists, but, owing
to the difficulties met with in obtaining sufficient support, it was in
danger of being abandoned, until the Council, after the full
consideration which the importance of the subject deserved, resolved to
take it in hand as part of the operations of the Society.
The Society has, however, not only been mindful of advancing scientific
knowledge--it has also endeavoured to spread some of this knowledge in a
popular manner by means of lectures. In former years these were only
given in an occasional manner; but the liberal bequest of Mr. Alfred
Davis to the Society in 1870 has enabled the Council to undertake a more
regular and systematic method of instruction; and the Fellows and others
have had every summer for several years past the opportunity of hearing
many of our most eminent naturalists and able expositors upon subjects
which they have made especially their own. I regret, however, to add
that the interest taken by the Society generally in these lectures has
not quite equalled the expectations that were raised when the question
of establishing them was first brought before the notice of the Council.
Although, as will be seen by a consideration of the various subjects
which I have already referred to, the Society has a wide sphere of
operation and many methods by which the objects of its founders are
carried out, it is undoubtedly the maintenance of the menagerie of
living animals in the Gardens where we are now assembled by which it is
best known both to the public as well as to a large number of our
Fellows. It will be well, therefore, before concluding, to add a few
words upon some points of interest connected with the past history and
present condition of this branch of the Society’s operations, the one
which is at the same time the largest source of its revenue and cause of
expenditure.