3qa Mr. Burnett's Illustrations of the Herpornithercs, 8fc. 



covery of them was known to manj^naturalists, both here and 

 on the continent, but h'e did not then, and does ti8t 'ti6w^6bTi- 

 sider them to be breasts. M. GeofFroy St. HiUiire ** mehtldris^ 

 that, notwithstanding M. Meckel's ability as an anatomist, he 

 has been deceived on this point, and that what he haid mis- 

 taken for mammae are something else." GeofFroy "considers 

 them as of the same nature as the odorous glands of squirrels." 

 ^"''Comparatively large as these subcutaneous abdominal 

 'masses are, a question might still be raised, as to whether 

 they may not be the repetition of a type of structure such 

 as nature delights to preserve, even when the use no longet 

 can exist, such as the male nipples and the vertebra promi- 

 nens in man, the human plantaris, and the muscles of 

 the external ear, the course of the recurrent nerve to 4 

 single upper larynx (the physiological reason of which Mr. 

 Herbert Mayo has lately pointed out,) &c. &c. And these 

 rudiments or remnants of the mammal type might be rea- 

 sonably expected to be much larger and more notorious in the 

 female than in the male, for the horny bill of the ornithorhyn- 

 chus is certainly unfitted for suckling, even if there were breasts 

 in the parent beast. Here, however, on the contrary, it must 

 be borne in mind, that the beak may be an after-growth ; and 

 it is not impossible that the young have lips, which subse- 

 quently may become abortive, and the bill then grow, as in 

 infants the gums at first are destitute of teeth : but this possi- 

 bility is not probable. Furthermore, the double penis, which 

 does not give passage to the urine, the opening of the uterin^ 

 horns separately into the common cloaca, without forming a pro- 

 per uterus, afford several parallels with oviparous animalg, as 

 birds and reptiles, and some fish ; and consequently favour the 

 accounts received on many hands, of their eggs being found, 

 which, although not sufficiently authenticated to be acknovv;^ 

 ledged, are yet too circumstantial to be positively denied. In- 

 deed, could system ever be allowed to suggest a discovery, it 

 might almost be predicated that even should the ornythorhyn- 

 chus be shewn to be mammalious, some other beasts will be 

 discovered that are destitute of breasts ; the general scheme of 

 nature seems to require such a connecting grade. 



The two genera, ornithorhyncus or platypus and echidna, 



