Scientific Illustration

biomedicalephemera:

When George Shaw first described a specimen of platypus brought to him by Captain John Hunter, the second governor of New South Wales, he (along with most naturalists of the time) thought it was a hoax. In his first description of it in 1799, he noted that it was “impossible not to entertain doubts as to its genuine nature”, and even took scissors to the dried skin sent to him in order to check for stitches. 

However, by the time he gave his lecture series at the Royal Institution, he had no doubts of its authenticity, though it still baffled him as to its true nature as an animal.

From Zoological lectures delivered at the Royal Institution. George Shaw, 1809.

(via biomedicalephemera)