CLASS1FICA TION 1 03 



fishes in that the occipital bone joins the frontal. It 

 is no doubt, as has already been pointed out, a 

 very curious fact in their anatomy, and one not easily 

 susceptible of an explanation. But to liken them to 

 fishes for this reason seems to prove too much ; what 

 we want on the " promammalian " theory is rather a 

 likeness with lowly-organised reptiles. It cannot, of 

 course, be seriously maintained, as Professor Albrecht 

 would have us believe, that the dorsal fin is an in- 

 heritance from a fish. Dr. Murie's comparison of it 

 to the hump of the camel is far better. 



Professor Weber has justly dwelt upon the ex- 

 cessively complicated brain, and upon the mode of 

 the attachment of the fcetus to its mother, in support 

 of the more orthodox view that the whales are not 

 primitive Mammalia at all. If we are to place them 

 in this position we must displace the monotrematous 

 mammals (Ornithorhynchus and Echidna), whose 

 organisation in so many points places them un- 

 questionably at the base of the existing mammals. 

 The general conclusion which best suits the facts at 

 our disposal seems to be to look upon the Cetacea 

 as an offshoot from an early group of the higher 

 Mammalia. This is unsatisfactory in its vagueness, 

 no doubt ; but it is difficult to see what more can 

 be said which is not entirely speculative and devoid 

 of foundation in ascertained fact. 



Having then attempted, and, it must be candidly 

 confessed, failed, to place the whales accurately in the 

 system, it remains to arrange them with reference to 

 each other. It is easier to do this than to solve the 



