Seaside Studies in Natural History:Marine Animals of Massachusetts Bay
Marine Animals of Massachusetts Bay
9781465545381
pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
This volume is published with the hope of supplying a want often expressed for some seaside book of a popular character, describing the marine animals common to our shores. There are many English books of this kind; but they relate chiefly to the animals of Great Britain, and can only have a general bearing on those of our own coast, which are for the most part specifically different from their European relatives. While keeping this object in view, an attempt has also been made to present the facts in such a connection, with reference to principles of science and to classification, as will give it in some sort the character of a manual of Natural History, in the hope of making it useful not only to the general reader, but also to teachers and to persons desirous of obtaining a more intimate knowledge of the subjects discussed in it. With this purpose, although nearly all the illustrations are taken from among the most common inhabitants of our bay, a few have been added from other localities in order to fill out this little sketch of Radiates, and render it, as far as is possible within such limits, a complete picture of the type. A few words of explanation are necessary with reference to the joint authorship of the book. The drawings and the investigations, where they are not referred to other observers, have been made by Mr. A. Agassiz, the illustrations having been taken, with very few exceptions, from nature, in order to represent the animals, as far as possible, in their natural attitudes; and the text has been written by Mrs. L. Agassiz, with the assistance of Mr. A. Agassiz’s notes and explanations. Cambridge, May, 1865. NOTE
