MARSUPIAL QUADRUPEDS OF NEW HOLLAND. 263 



ments of a good system, and no system destitute of these qua- 

 lities can be either true to nature or useful in its application 

 to practical purposes, it is impossible to conceive an arrange- 

 ment more deficient in these essential characters than that 

 of M. Cuvier. It is in vain that we here search for any 

 systematic or leading idea of classification; there is no 

 principle of method : and the author's only rule appears 

 to have been some arbitrary and undefined notions of rela- 

 tions, which he himself has not been able to clothe in lan- 

 guage. Nor is this the only logical objection, however fatal 

 to its pretences as a method. Not only is half the number 

 of genera which belong to the order, comprised in the 

 first division alone, but no fewer than four but of the six di- 

 visions of M. Cuvier contain only a single genus each, whilst 

 there are no less than six families to twelve genera ; circum- 

 stances which betray either an unpardonably faulty classifi- 

 cation, or an extremely defective knowledge of the constitu- 

 ent members of the group. The latter excuse, however, is 

 by no means admissible ; the generic forms of the marsupials 

 were perfectly well known to Baron Cuvier, who has denned 

 and characterised them with his accustomed accuracy and 

 elegance ; and the real defects of his arrangement will be 

 found to arise from a slavish adherence to the modifications 

 of the dentition, and even to the least influential and impor- 

 tant parts of it; viz. the mere number of the incisors, and the 

 comparative size and number of the false molars and rudimen- 

 tary canines ; for it is often difficult among the marsupials to 

 determine to which of these orders a particular tooth belongs. 

 This is the only thing like a uniform principle that I can dis- 

 cover ; but it is so awkwardly mixed up with other extrane- 

 ous characters, as to deprive the arrangement of simplicity 

 and precision. The first division, for instance, unites all the 

 marsupials which have more than six incisors in the upper, 

 and more than two in the lower jaw, without regard to any 

 other quality, however prominent or influential. Hence we 

 find the arborial didelphs, the aquatic yapocks, the digitigrade 

 thylacines, the saltigrade perameles, the carnivorous dasyures, 

 the insectivorous phascogales, and the fhigivorous opossums, 

 some with large caeca, some with small caeca, and some with- 

 out any caeca whatever, * all jumbled together without distinc- 

 tion ; and separated from genera to which they are most in- 

 timately related by the more influential details of their- struc- 

 ture, habits and appetites, merely because they happen to 

 agree in the very uninfluential character derived from the 



1 On the faith of Dr. Giant. April, 1839. 



