A Manual Of Zoology For The Use Of Students Volume 1

Author : Thomas Jeffery Parker
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 600 pages
Book Rating : 4.A/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Manual of Zoology written by Thomas Jeffery Parker and published by . This book was released on 1900 with total page 600 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preface: In planning the present work the aim of the authors has been to provide a manual embodying a course of study adapted to the requirements of the student chiefly in higher classes of schools, and to some extent in junior classes of universities. To make this, within the necessarily narrow limits of space imposed, anything more than a bare synopsis, it has been necessary to restrict the extent of the ground covered. This has been done (1) by leaving out altogether certain classes of existing animals; (2) by omitting all descriptions of extinct groups; (3) by dealing only very briefly with embryology. Opinions must differ as to the best selection of groups for an elementary manual of this kind. But broadly, there can, it has appeared to us, be little doubt that what should be omitted, or only briefly dealt with, are the groups of rare occurrence and uncertain relationships, the greater part of the space being devoted to the more familiar representatives of the large phyla. A course of laboratory and museum instruction, supplemented by work in the field and on the seashore, is absolutely necessary in order that any sound knowledge of zoology may be attained. The present manual does not provide such instruction, but is intended to be used in association with it, and the examples selected for description are such as may under most circumstances be readily obtained. The general plan is similar to that followed in the Text-Book of Zoology by the same authors, but the restricted space has necessitated considerable modifications. We have not adopted the method, followed in various recent manuals, of beginning with one of the larger Invertebrata or with a vertebrate, and working from that upwards and downwards. The reasons given for such a mode of treatment we understand to be that if we begin with the simplest animals, the Protozoa, we discourage and embarass the beginner by introducing him at once into a world entirely new to him requiring him at the same time to learn the use of an entirely unfamiliar instrument the microscope. But in our opinion, the difficulty is much less than is alleged by the advocates of the alternative method, and the advantage of presenting the facts at the outset in a natural and logical order by far outweigh any such disadvantages. We are convinced that any general acquaintance which the student may possess beforehand with a rabbit or a crayfish will be of little real value to him when he begins to take up seriously the study of its structure. Moreover an elementary knowledge of the use of the microscope is absolutely essential to any adequate study of Zoology as an intellectual discipline, and this difficulty, such as it is, may as well be met first as last. Owing to the lamented death of Professor T. Jeffrey Parker, at a time when but little progress had been made with this work, his actual share in it has been but slight: but as it was planned between us, and the earlier parts had the advantage of his revision, and more especially as it owes a great deal to his work in the Text-Book it has been thought right to let it appear under our joint names as originally intended. I have to express very great indebtedness to Professor W. Newton Parker for the pains he has taken in revising the proof-sheets and for many valuable suggestions which he has made during the progress of the work.--William A. Haskell.