The present volume includes the lives of the more eminent zoologists, from Aristotle to Linnaeus. Those who succeeded the latter will furnish ample materials for another. It is scarcely necessary to remark, that these volumes may either be considered as complete in themselves, or as introductory to a general and particular description of the various tribes of animals. A work on this most extensive subject is a great desideratum in English literature,--not that books on this department of science are wanting, but because we have none that present a continuous view of the families end species of the different classes, at once intelligible to the student of nature, attractive to the general reader, and free from that meagreness of phraseology necessarily peculiar to the composers of systematic catalogues. It is not now required of us to point out the advantages that might result from the establishment of natural history as a branch of popular education. These advantages have been repeatedly pressed on the notice of the public; and, although the system has not been as yet adopted, the time cannot be far distant when the elements of mineralogy, botany, and zoology shall be taught in our schools, along with those branches of knowledge which at present occupy the field, to the exclusion of others not less adapted for the improvement of the youthful mind. "To constitute such pursuits a prominent part of elementary education," says a popular writer, "would without doubt be erroneous: it is, however, certain that none are more eminently fitted to fill the minds of youth with admiration of the numerous contrivances and proofs of design afforded in every part of the creation, and to inspire them with exalted conceptions of the Supreme Being."[B] We are of opinion, notwithstanding, that they ought to occupy a distinct place in elementary education, because they possess many important recommendations, of which those mentioned are certainly not the least. The study of nature may be pursued in any degree, as a relaxation from other studies, as a pleasing occupation invigorating alike to the mind and the body, or as a science capable of calling into action the noblest faculties of man, and of affording employment to intellects of even a higher order than any of those who have hitherto acquired distinction in the walks of literature. Natural history has already to boast of an Aristotle, a Ray, a Reaumur, a Linnaeus, a Haller, a Hunter, and a Cuvier. What other science can rank abler men among its cultivators? And, as is remarked by one of the most eminent naturalists that this country has produced, the late president of the Linnaean Society, "How delightful and how consolatory it is, among the disappointments and anxieties of life, to observe science, like virtue, retaining its relish to the last!" FOOTNOTES: [A] Mrs R. Lee's Memoirs of Baron Cuvier, p. 51. [B] Quarterly Review, vol. xxxvi. p. 219. ARISTOTLE. SECTION I.