Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they are listed at the end of the text. Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Project Gutenberg has the other two volumes of this work. Volume I: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44056. Volume III: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44058. * * * * * Zoological Illustrations, OR ORIGINAL FIGURES AND DESCRIPTIONS OF NEW, RARE, OR INTERESTING ANIMALS, SELECTED CHIEFLY FROM THE CLASSES OF Ornithology, Entomology, and Conchology, AND ARRANGED ACCORDING TO THEIR APPARENT AFFINITIES. BY WM. SWAINSON, ESQ., F.R.S., F.L.S. ASSISTANT COMMISSARY GENERAL TO H. M. FORCES. CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF PARIS; HONORARY MEMBER OF THE HISTORIC SOCIETY OF NEW YORK; MEMBER OF THE WERNERIAN SOCIETY, &c. &c. &c. VOL. II. SECOND SERIES. London: PRINTED BY W. J. SPARROW, BERNERS MEWS, BERNERS STREET. PUBLISHED BY BALDWIN & CRADOCK, PATERNOSTER ROW, AND R. HAVELL, 77, OXFORD STREET. 1831-2. * * * * * * TO HIS MOST CHRISTIAN MAJESTY, Louis Philippe, KING OF THE FRENCH, Whom as a PRIVATE GENTLEMAN, exiled by despotism from his native country, enjoyed that respect which the dignity of virtue can alone ensure; whom, as a PRINCE, descended from a race of Kings, gained the affections of a whole people;--as the KING of a great and intellectual nation, enjoys the love and veneration of the wise and the good; and as a true PATRON OF SCIENCE, munificently encourages, both privately and publicly, all who are engaged in its pursuit, THIS VOLUME OF ZOOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATIONS, Is dedicated, WITH SENTIMENTS OF THE HIGHEST ADMIRATION AND OF THE GREATEST RESPECT, BY THE AUTHOR. * * * * * * PREFACE. ---- The present state of science in Britain, the usual subject of our preface, has recently been discussed by powerful writers;[1] and has drawn from others,[2] equally eminent, bitter reflections. As regards Zoology, there is a great show of patronage. Zoological gardens, and new societies have sprang up: cheap publications, on _popular_ natural history, appear daily; and professors have been installed at the two London Universities. Yet what has resulted? We have lecturers expounding systems they do not comprehend,[3] and we have professors maintaining that a walk into the fields will make "a very good naturalist."[4] Meantime nearly every periodical work on pure science has languished or died away. The _Zoological Journal_ has been discontinued, although nominally patronized by a society enjoying an enormous annual receipt. The fact, indeed, is but too apparent, that the science of the country, _speaking generally_, has become superficial, while "neither literature nor art has been encouraged in our opulent Island, half as much as they have been by some of the petty kingdoms of the Continent."[5]