much remains to be done in this subject, as far as is known at present, two principal and distinct types of placentation, without any transitional forms, appear to prevail among the Mammalia monodelphia. One of these has been termed "caducous," "coherent," or "deciduate," the other "non-caducous," "incoherent," or "nondeciduate," according as the placenta, after separating from the uterine walls at parturition, consists of both maternal and fœtal elements or of the latter only. Man, the apes, lemurs, bats, the Insectivora, Carnivora and Rodentia, with Elephas and Hyrax, belong to the first group. The Artiodactyla, Perissodactyla (excluding Hyrax), Cetacea, and probably the Edentata, belong to the second. Whether these are natural groups, and their other characters bear out this system of classification, is a question which demands the attentive consideration of cultivators of mammalian anatomy. The second part of the book is commenced by an exceedingly perspicuous account of the structure and development of the human skull, which every anatomical student would do well to make himself thoroughly master of. Although the method in which the whole of this hackneyed, but yet difficult subject is handled is eminently original, it is in the account of the development of the so-called temporal bone," that the principal novelty will be found by the anthropotomist. Passing at once from the human skull to the opposite extremity of the series of animals possessing a bony skeleton, the skull of an osseous fish, the Pike, is selected for description and comparison with that of Man; and then the intermediate conditions are filled up by accounts of the principal modifications of the cranial elements in Fish, Amphibia, Reptiles, and Mammals. These descriptions are, as the author says, "confined as far as possible to a statement of matters of fact, and to the conclusions which immediately flow from the application of a very simple method of interpretation to the facts. That method of interpretation is based upon the principle that, in any two skulls, those parts which are identical in their principal relations in the adult state, and in the mode in which they reach this state (or in their development), are corresponding, or homologous, parts, and need to be denominated by the same terms." "By the application of this method," Professor Huxley continues, "it has been possible to demonstrate the existence of a fundamental unity of organization in all vertebrate skulls; and, furthermore, to prove that all bony skulls, however much they may differ in appear ance, are organized upon a common plan, no important bone existing in the highest vertebrate skull, which is not recognisable in the lowest completely ossified cranium." "The enunciation of these results alone is a 'Theory of the Skull,' but it is by no means what is commonly understood as the theory of the skull." The author then proceeds, with his accustomed vigour, to do battle with those who have pushed their conclusions of the nature of the cranial bones to fanciful extremes, more especially as regards the vertebral theory, originated by Goethe and Oken, and popularized in this country by Professor Owen. The skull is shown to have developmentally no relation with the vertebræ, and in its membranous and cartilaginous states to be not even segmented. When completely ossified, it is admitted to consist of four very definite segments, but that these segments are equivalent to one another, or are homologous to vertebræ, or have connected with them parts homologous to "limbs" in any sense of the word, are hypotheses which appear quite irreconcilable with the facts brought to light by developmental research. For a succinct outline, both of the principal theories advanced on this subject, and of the observations arrayed against them, we must refer our readers to the work itself, which will be found on the shelves of every anatomist who wishes to keep himself au courant with the progress of this department of science. LXI.-ARISTOTELIAN ZOOLOGY. DIE THIERARTEN DES ARISTOTELES, VON DEN KLASSEN, DER SÄUGETHIERE, VÖGEL, REPTILIEN UND INSECTEN. Von Carl J. Sundevall. Uebersetzung aus dem Schwedischen. Stockholm, 1863, 1 vol. 242 pp. PROFESSOR Carl J. Sundevall, Custos of the National Zoological Museum of Sweden at Stockholm, is well known as one of the most learned and most industrious of the justly renowned naturalists of Scandinavia. In the classes of Mammals and Birds, to which he had devoted much attention, Professor Sundevall is universally recognized as a high authority. It is with pleasure, therefore, we receive the present German translation of two articles of the Zoology of Aristotle, which have lately appeared in the Transactions of the ** Royal Academy of Sciences of Stockholm, as the language in which they were originally published, rendered them inaccessible to the great body of European Naturalists and Classical Scholars, by whom alike they will be much appreciated. The translation is also of greater value as having been revised and corrected by the author himself, so that we may consider the present issue as forming something in the nature of a new edition of the original essays. As Professor Sundevall observes in his introduction, the attempt to identify the animals known to Aristotle, and the other classical Greek and Roman writers, is by no means novel, although as yet nothing eminently successful has been produced upon this subject. As long ago as the 16th century, Gessner, Belon, and Aldrovand devoted some attention to this question, not very successfully, except in the case of the first of these writers. Strack, whose German translation of Aristotle's great work (Tepi rà Zwa) was published at Frankfort in 1816, is the earliest of the more modern authorities who have given their attention to this subject. But Strack contented himself with only giving the German and Latin names of Aristotle's animals, when the species spoken of was obvious and easily recognised, and in most cases has left Aristotle's Greek names just as they were merely writing them according to Latin orthography. In Kulb's more recent German translation of Aristotle'st works, much greater pains has been taken with the nomenclature, and many explanatory notes are devoted to this part of the subject, but in Kulb's work even where exact results are supposed to be arrived at, and a modern systematic name is given, this is in some cases unfortunately wrong. Besides the translators of Aristotle, many systematic writers on Zoology have alluded cursorily to the species mentioned in the works of their great predecessor. Cuvier and Johann Müller have recognized some of the species of fishes mentioned by Aristotle; Wiegman has devoted a special essay to some of the Mammals, and Gloger is the author of a learned treatise concerning the birds. There are, indeed, a considerable number of German "disquisitiones Academica" upon various points of Aristotelian Zoology, but these, as is well known, are in many cases exceedingly difficult to procure, and even the indefatigable zeal of Professor * Kongl. Vet. Akad. Förhandlingar (1862), Vol, iv. Disquisitio de Avibus ab Aristotle commemoratis: Vratislaviæ, 1830. Sundevall has not been rewarded by the sight of several of them. With the assistance of these authorities, or such of them as he has been able to refer to, and the further still more important advantage of an intimate acquaintance with the science of Natural History, which few, if any, of the previous commentators have enjoyed, Prof. Sundevall has now produced an essay which will go far to settle without much doubt all the easily determinable species of Aristotelian Zoology. But we must recollect that Aristotle's great work "about animals" (repì rà Zwa),* is not a special work upon Zoology, in which the Animal Kingdom is brought before the reader in its natural Orders, but is rather an anatomical and physiological treatise upon the organs of animals, external and internal, with allusions also to their habits and mode of propagation. So that each individual animal, instead of being described in a manner which would render it easily determinable, is often only mentioned by its name, or in allusion to one or more of its peculiarities. It also results from this mode of treatment, that no correct zoological order is followed in Aristotle's work, and that the most nearly allied species are often alluded to in very different passages. Professor Sundevall's treatise, which is now before us, constitutes -what was much needed-a zoological index to the species of animals mentioned by Aristotle in his great work, arranged according to modern zoological classification. Taking the species, one after another, under the Greek name used for it by Aristotle, Professor Sundevall cites the different passages in which it is mentioned, and the chief peculiarities which are recorded of it. He then proceeds to comment upon these points, and gives the most probable determination of the species, as deducible from Aristotle's account of it. The total number of Mammals, indicated by Aristotle, and thus reduced into order by Professor Sundevall, appears to be about 70, of Birds, 150—of Reptiles, 20-and of Fishes about 116-making altogether 356 species of vertebrate animals. Of the invertebrate classes, about 60 species of Insects and Arachnida seem to have been known to Aristotle-some 24 Crustaceans and Annelides, and about 40 Molluscs and Radiates, making altogether 124 species of this divi * Our readers need hardly be reminded that this work, though not the only zoological treatise written by Aristotle, is by far the most complete one, and that the others (περὶ Ζωων μορίων, περὶ πορείας, &c.) are of very minor importance as regards Systematic Zoology. sion. On the whole, we may consider that Aristotle had a more or less intimate acquaintance with about 500 different species of animals, —a wonderful fact, when we consider the age in which he lived (385 B. C. to 335 B. C.), and that he was absolutely the earliest writer on Natural History. To the greater number of these 500 species, Professor Sundevall has either assigned the correct name, according to modern science, or has at least indicated the most probably correct determination. Little more, we think, remains to be done in this matter, as far as regards either classical criticism, or the present state of zoological knowledge. But there is no doubt that a careful study of the Fauna of Greece and south-eastern Europe generally, together with an ascertainment of the modern Greek names, by which the animals of those countries are now known, may be of great assistance, in throwing further light on the question of the exact specific names to be attached to many of the doubtful names of Aristotelian Zoology. LXII. THE MUSK AND ITS ALLIES. RECHERCHES ANATOMIQUES ZOOLOGIQUES ET PALEONTOLOGIQUES SUR LA FAMILLE DES CHEVROTAINS. Par Alphonse Milne-Edwards. Paris, 1864. 1 vol. 132 pp. (Ann. d. Sc. Nat. Ser. 5, vol. iii.) DR. ALPHONSE MILNE-EDWARDS' essay on the Chevrotains or Muskdeer, lately published in the Annales des Sciences Naturelles,' is a valuable contribution to the history of these imperfectly known Mammals, which are of much interest, not only from their somewhat isolated position among the series of existing Ruminants, but also from their connection with several rather obscure extinct forms of animals. The family of Moschide, as usually considered, embraces not only the true Musk (Moschus) of Northern and Central Asia, but also a small group of Ruminants of Tropical Asia and Africa, of the genera Tragulus and Hyomoschus, which have been hitherto united with them. The latter, however, Dr. Milne-Edwards considers ought more correctly to constitute a distinct family of Ruminants, and for which he proposes the name Tragulida. The members of both the families possess the common attributes of being Ruminants of small size, without any vestige of horns upon N.H.R.-1864. 2 L |