A NATURAL HISTORY OF The Globe, and of Man; BEASTS, BIRDS, FISHES, REPTILES, AND INSECTS. FROM THE WRITINGS OF BUFFON, CUVIER, LACEPEDE, AND OTHER EMINENT NATURALISTS. TO WHICH ARE ADDED, ELEMENTS OF BOTANY. WITH UPWARDS OF FOUR HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD. IN FOUR VOLUMES. VOL. I. ADVERTISEMENT. FEW studies are at once more attractive and more beneficial, especially to youthful minds, than the study of Natural History. While the contemplation of the habits, manners, and instincts of the myriads of species that people the earth, the air, and the waters, affords a perennial source of amusement, it can scarcely fail, at the same time, to raise our thoughts to Him by whose omnipotent fiat those myriads were originally called into existence; and by whom they were placed under the dominion of Man. It can, therefore, hardly be necessary to apologize for the publication of a work which is intended to promote a study of such blended importance and pleasure. In the volumes which are now submitted to the Public, an attempt has been made to compress into a convenient compass the principal facts in the history of animate and inanimate nature; to avoid every thing which might render the subject repulsive to unlearned readers; and to assist the comprehension, and gratify the taste, by pictorial illustrations, which, it is hoped, will be found to be VOL. I. a |