150 Zoological Society. 



cular system worthy of notice were the large size and slight plexiform 

 arrangement of the lingual veins at the under part of the base of the 

 tongue. The inner surface of the lips, especially where they 

 join to form the angles of the mouth, was beset with numerous 

 close-set, strong, retroverted and pointed papillce, similar to those 

 distributed over the interior of the gullet in the Chelonice ; a struc- 

 ture which is also present in other Ruminants. 



The palate was beset with about sixteen irregular transverse 

 ridges, having a free denticulate edge directed backwards ; an appa- 

 ratus for detaining the food, and ensuring its deglutition, which Mr. 

 Owen notices as especially required in the Giraffe, by reason of the 

 small comparative size of its head and jaws : he also refers to the 

 mechanical obstacles, which oppose the escape of the food when re- 

 gurgitated, in the Ruminantia generally, as the presence of buccal 

 papillce, &c. as an evidence on which to found an argument of spe- 

 cial adaptation or design. This structure is noticed by Cuvier, but 

 considered by him as only coexistent with the occurrence of papillce 

 upon the lining membrane of the stomach, and as a condition of 

 parts which furnishes no obvious indication of any connexion with 

 final causes ; with a view of showing that no such relation of coex- 

 istence as that imagined by Cuvier, in the presence of papillce upon 

 different portions of the alimentary canal, can be positively esta- 

 blished, Mr. Owen instances the Turtle, which has these callous 

 bodies in great abundance, but entirely restricted to the lining mem- 

 brane of the oesophagus, in which situation their use is sufficiently 

 apparent. The great omentum, in the female, was studded reticularly 

 with fat, as in the Ruminants generally. In the male, on raising the 

 paunch, the spiral coils of the colon (characteristic of the Ruminants) 

 came into view, together with the rest of the jejunum and ilium, upon 

 the removal of which the third and fourth stomachs, and the small 

 liver wholly confined to the right of the mesial plane, were exposed. 

 The spleen, as usual in the Ruminantia, had its concave surface 

 applied to the left side of the first stomach or rumen. 



The kidneys occupied the usual position in the loins, the right 

 one a little more advanced than the left ; their figure was rounded 

 and compact, as in the Deer and Antelopes, and they were not ex- 

 ternally lobated as in the Ox. 



The cells of the reticulum, as in the Reindeer, were extremely shallow, 

 their boundaries appearing only as raised lines ; but there was the same 

 form and grouping of the cells as obtains throughout the Ruminants 

 generally, the arrangement being that by which the greatest number 

 are included in the least possible space. 



