there could be no apoplexy without effusion; but the want of logical precision here is evident, unless we grant, what I believe few physiologists would admit, that compression from fluids is the only cause of the disease. That some degree of pressure may be made on the brain without producing either coma or apoplexy, may be conceded as proved by M. Serres's experiments; but it by no means follows that a different or greater pressure would not produce these diseases; indeed, both observation and experiment decidedly show, that compression does sometimes, according to its degree, give occasion, first to somnolency, and then to complete apoplexy. It is a fact perfectly well known, that after the operation of the trepan, pressure on the part deprived of cranium produces these effects and innumerable instances might be addueed in which compression by depressed bone, after accidents, has given occasion to coma and apoplexy.' Sir A. Cooper had the kindness to furnish the author with the particulars of an experiment on a dog, which places the effects of pressure on the brain, in producing apoplexy, in a very distinct point of view. This is one among many instances in which Dr. C. has been assisted in his inquiries by some of our most distinguished medical characters; and Dr. Abercrombie also has furnished a valuable communication, in which he states, with much clearness and brevity, the various causes, besides that of mere pressure, which occasionally give rise to palsy. All of these appear to induce this affection by altering the healthy organization of some part of the brain; an effect which, we know, pressure will also undoubtedly produce. Under the head of Treatment, the most approved methods and most efficacious remedies are duly considered. Palsy arising from disease of the vertebræ has not, however, received from the author all that attention which it merited; perhaps from a conviction that it falls most properly under the care of the surgeon. Dr. C. mentions the doubts which have arisen in the minds of some persons as to the efficacy of caustic issues in this disorder, but without explaining the views of those writers, or the plan which they suggest as a substitute for that practice. The horizontal posture, on which those gentlemen place much reliance, and which certainly is a powerful auxiliary in the treatment of the disease, is not mentioned by Dr. Cooke, An appendix is subjoined, containing an abstract of a Report furnished by Dr. Gordon, of the facts noted in the practice of the British army during the years 1819 and 1820, respecting apoplexy and palsy. In England, during a period of six months, three cases of apoplexy and four of palsy occurred among 5999 cavalry; while of 11,865 infantry, བསད་ར during during the same length of time, only one was attacked with apoplexy, and five with palsy. Among 6190 Veterans, three cases of apoplexy and four of palsy occurred. In the Indian peninsula, during a period of eight months, 15 cases of apoplexy and 18 of palsy took place among 12,800 men. Here we have distinct evidence of the effects of the accidents attending cavalry-service, of the influence of age, and of that of a warm climate, in producing these diseases. We beg to congratulate Dr. Cooke on the successful prosecution of his labors, and to encourage him to carry them on to other diseases which, as yet, do not appear to have entered into his plan. We feel not a little obliged to him for the excellent monographs which he has thus furnished, of two very important disorders, apoplexy and palsy; and we cannot hesitate to recommend the volumes before us, as valuable additions to the library of the medical student and even of the advanced practitioner. It is to be regretted, however, that in a work which is so professedly compiled, the author has occasionally neglected to note distinctly the publications containing the opinions and statements to which he has referred; and, should a second edition of this treatise be required, which its merits render highly probable, we hope that this omission will be supplied. Indeed, it would be an improve ment to prefix, as botanical writers often do, a complete catalogue of the titles of all the works quoted. A still greater addition would be made to the value of these volumes by subjoining to each of them a full and accurate index, of which every reader who peruses them with attention must at present feel the want. ART. XI. The Philosophy of Zoology; or, a general View of the Structure, Functions, and Classification of Animals. By Joha Fleming, D.D., Minister of Flisk, Fifeshire, F. R. S. Edinb., of the Wernerian Natural History Society, &c. 8vo. 2 Vols. With Engravings. Hurst and Co. 1822. W VE had some time ago occasion to report the Philosophy of Zoology by the Chevalier de Lamarck, and to point out a few of the extravagant and untenable positions of that ingenious but excentric naturalist. The present writer, however, whose scientific communications in the Wernerian Transactions we have also announced in the course of their publi cation, pursues a more sober track of thinking, and sustains throughout his pages the tone of accurate and consistent reasoning. His views are properly divested of the mere figments of fancy and conjecture, are generally grounded on 0 3 correct correct principles, and are in strict accordance with the pious convictions of the creative and governing energies of the Deity. He has the merit, therefore, of having filled up an important chasm in British literature, and of having performed his task with a reference to the dictates of sound logic, as well as to the recent enlargements and discoveries in the department of natural science. Rejecting that blind adherence to the principles and arrangements of the Linnéan school, which in this country has mainly contributed to retard the progress of zoological knowlege, Dr. Fleming commences his plan by assigning the limits between organic and inorganic matter; and the characters which he cascribes to each will, we presume, with a little latitude of interprétation, be generally admitted. At all events, the presence of the vital principle, whose phænomena we may in vain attempt to resolve into any description of mechanical or chemical action with which we are acquainted, will suffice to the discrimination of these two grand classes of natural objects. In virtue of their constitution, moreover, all living beings are indued with certain appetencies, or instincts, as they have been 1 called; which enable them to regulate the supply of food, to sobviate difficulties, to repair injuries, and to procreate their "race. The conditions of vitality are judiciously considered under the heads of a parent, moisture, temperature, atmospheric air, and nourishment. While we are as reluctant as Dr. F. can be to adopt the notions of the antients with respect to equivocal generation, we cannot refrain from remarking that the origin of many of the intestinal vermes is still enveloped in obscurity; no satisfactory experiments having demonstrated its analogy to that of other tribes with whose history we are acquainted. Whence, for example, has proceeded the embryo of the solitary tapeworm, or whence the germ of those hydatids which inhabit the very substance of the liver, or other viscera? Before dismissing this part of our subject,' observes the author, it is necessary to take notice of those facts illustrative of the origin of organized beings, which have been ascertained by the researches of modern geologists. In investigating the structure and composition of the rocks which constitute the crust of the earth, it is observed, that they enclose the remains of animals or vegetables, more or less altered in their texture. Presupposing that those rocks on which all the others rest are the most ancient; and after dividing them according to their age, as determined by their superposition; it has been ascertained, that the organic remains found in the older rocks differ from those which occur in the more recent strata, and that they are all different from the plants and animals which now exist on the surface of the globe. It like wise appears, that the petrifactions contained in the newer strata bear a nearer resemblance to the existing races than those which belong to the rocks of an older date; and that the remains of those animals which have always been the companions of man are only to be found in the most recent of the alluvial deposites. In the older rocks, the impressions of the less perfect plants, such as ferns and reeds, are more numerous than those of the dicotyledenous tribes, and the remains of shells and corals abound, while there are few examples of petrified fish. In the more recent strata, the remains of reptiles, birds, and quadrupeds, occur, all of them differing from the existing kinds. Attempts have been made to account for these circumstances by supposing, that the present races of animals and vegetables are the descendants of those whose remains have been preserved in the rocks, and that the difference of character may have arisen from a change in the physical constitution of the air, or the surface of the earth, producing a corresponding change on the forms of organized beings. The influence of cultivation on vegetables, of domestication on animals, and of climate on man himself, may be considered as strengthening the conjecture. But there are several difficulties which present themselves to those who adopt this opinion. The effect of circumstances on the appearance of living beings is circumscribed within certain limits, so that no transmutation of species was ever ascertained to take place; and it is well known that the fossil-species differ as much, nay more, from the recent kinds, as these last do from one another. It remains, likewise, for the abettors of this opinion, to connect the extinct with the living races, by ascertaining the intermediate links or transitions. This task, we fear, will not be executed speedily. There is yet another view of the matter which suggests itself. If the seeds of some plants, and the eggs of certain animals, be so minute as to be excluded with difficulty from any place to which air and water have access, and if they are capable of retaining, for an indefinite length of time, the vital principle, when circumstances are not favourable to its evolution, the crust of the earth may be considered as a mere receptacle of germs, each of which is ready to expand into vegetable or animal forms, upon the occurrence of those conditions necessary to its growth. According to this view, the germs of the ferns and palms first expanded their leaves, and afterwards those of the staminiferous vegetables. With regard to animals, it may be supposed that the germs of the zoophytes only were first disclosed; afterwards those of the testaceous mollusca; and, finally, those of the vertebral animals: that the organized beings of the first periods flourished during the continuance of the circumstances which were suitable to their growth; and that the change which prepared the way for the evolution of those which lived at a subsequent period contributed to the extinction of the earlier races. According to this statement, there is little difficulty in accounting for the exinction and revival of the different races of the less perfect animals and vegetables, whose germs appear, even at 04 present, present, to be regulated according to such circumstances. But it i offers no solution of the difficulty attending the preservation of the germs of the more perfect animals, many of which are inseparably connected with the parent, and require the continuance of her life to preserve vitality until the period of evolution. If, then, the present races of quadrupeds did not exist at the time when the mammoth and the other extinct quadrupeds, whose bones Cuvier ! has described with so much accuracy, were the denizens of our plains, at what period, and under what peculiar physical circumstances, were they called into being? Is the generation of organized beings simultaneous or successive? Have they all been created at once; but, in the progress of time, so modified by the influence of external agents, as now to appear under different forms? Or have they been called into being at different periods, according as the state of the earth became suitable for their reception? The latter supposition is countenanced by many geological documents.' * The modifications of the vital principle, as the healthy or diseased state of the system, age, monstrosity, &c. are next briefly reviewed; and it is asserted that this principle forms the organized body,-a position which some may be inclined to contest: but whether life precedes organization or organization precedes life, or whether they are of simultaneous origin, are points which seem to lie beyond the powers of our determination; and all that we can safely pronounce is that vitality, in the common acceptation of the term, resides only in organized forms. Having stated the general properties and characters of organized substances, the author proceeds, with much distinctness and ability, to illustrate the essential points of difference between animals and vegetables, in composition, structure, action, and nutrition; insisting particularly on the absence of a nervous system in vegetables, and on their consequent want of the faculties of sensation and voluntary motion. The relations of the various kinds of beings to one another are discussed under the Policy of Nature. That the mass of the globe could exist without its organized inhabitants we are not disposed to question, if the proposition be taken in a general sense: but, if we admit the animal origin of some of the secondary lime-stones, and the vegetable origin of the coalstrata, it should not be received without limitation. Neither is it demonstrable that, if the earth were placed nearer the sun, or more remote from that luminary, organized existences would be destroyed by excess or defect of temperature; because it is * See Cuvier's Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles de Quadrupèdes.' by |