shall ye eat. And all that have not fins and
scales in the seas and the rivers, of all that swarm in the waters
(all the _sheretzim_ of the waters), they shall be an abomination unto
you." Here the general term _sheretz_ includes all the fishes and the
invertebrate animals of the waters. From the whole of the above
passages we learn that this is a general term for all the invertebrate
animals and the two lower classes of vertebrates, or, in other words,
for the whole animal kingdom except the mammalia and birds. To all
these creatures the name is particularly appropriate, all of them
being oviparous or ovoviviparous, and consequently producing great
numbers of young and multiplying very rapidly. The only other
creatures which can be included under the term are the two doubtful
species of small mammals already mentioned. Nothing can be more fair
and obvious than this explanation of the term, based both on etymology
and on the precise nomenclature of the ceremonial law. We conclude,
therefore, that the prolific animals of the fifth day's creation
belonged to the three Cuvierian sub-kingdoms of the Radiata,
Articulata, and Mollusca, and to the classes of Fish and Reptiles
among the vertebrata.

2. One peculiar group of _sheretzim_ is especially distinguished by
name--the _tanninim_, or "great whales" of our version. It would be
amusing, had we time, to notice the variety of conjectures to which
this word has given rise, and the perplexities of commentators in
reference to it. In our version and the Septuagint it is usually
rendered dragon; but in this place the seventy have thought proper to
put _Ketos_ (whale), and our translators have followed them.
Subsequent translators and commentators have laid under contribution
all sorts of marine monsters, including the sea-serpent, in their
endeavors to attach a precise meaning to the word; while others have
been content to admit that it may signify any kind or all kinds of
large aquatic animals. The greater part of the difficulty appears to
have arisen from confounding two distinct words, _tannin_ and _tan_,
both names of animals; and the confusion has been increased by the
circumstance that in two places the words have been interchanged,
probably by errors of transcribers. _Tan_ occurs in twelve places, and
from these we can gather that it inhabits ruined cities, deserts, and
places to which ostriches resort, that it suckles its young, is of
predaceous and shy habits, utters