Forms of animal life : being outlines of zoological classification based upon anatomical investigation and illustrated by descriptions of specimens and of figures / by George Rolleston.

  • Rolleston, George, 1829-1881.
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Forms of animal life : being outlines of zoological classification based upon anatomical investigation and illustrated by descriptions of specimens and of figures / by George Rolleston. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    preparation or specimen should precede that ot the accounts in the introduction of the Class and Sub¬ kingdom to which it belongs, and that the study ot the Descriptions of the Plates should be taken up only after the attainment of a considerable familiarity with actual specimens by the practice of dissection. A short statement of the method which has been adopted in the preparation of each specimen has in most cases been prefixed to the description of it; and thus persons who have not, as well as those who have, access to the series in the University Museum, are en¬ abled to reproduce for themselves the objects described. The specimens themselves, it will be observed, are in the great majority of instances taken from animals which may be found living in inland parts of this country; and even when they have been taken from an exclusively marine Class or Sub-kingdom, such as the Tunicata or the Echinodermata, they are, with an exception or two, readily procurable in places at a distance from the sea-coasta. Small print has been employed in the notes and in other passages, which the student may do well to omit when first reading this book. In some cases, even the beginner will find it necessary a A dissecting microscope will be required for the verification of the Descriptions of many of the Preparations of the Invertebrata, and in these cases the specimens should be affixed to a loaded cork or wax tablet, and dissected under water or spirit. Some of these animals are speedily killed by being placed in a glass-stoppered bottle with a few drops of chloroform ; others by immersion in water several degrees below I40°F.