XX HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION 



which appeared between the first and second editions of the hegons^ 

 Cuvier adds and codifies the work already published in 1800 in the 

 first and second volumes of the Legons^ and he now gives for the first 

 time a very good description with figures of the entire skeleton of 

 Salamandra, which is compared with that of the Frog. His interpre- 

 tation of the bones of the skull naturally differs from modern usage. 

 For example, he describes the posterior nares as entering the mouth 

 behind the vomer, but as Cuvier's vomer is a pre-vomer the position 

 of the internal nares is not as anomalous as he supposed. The 

 Y-shaped or ypsiloid cartilage in front of the pubic symphysis, which 

 he compares with the marsupial bone of Mammals, had been already 

 described, figured, and named by Townson. The Urodele types are 

 somewhat confused in Cuvier's work, and it is not always certain 

 to which of them a particular statement refers. 



In Daudin's voluminous treatise on the Reptiles (1803) the Sala- 

 manders are correctly located with the Frogs and separated from the 

 Lizards and Reptiles. The idea was not a new one, but hitherto it 

 had not been expressed in any classification. Thus Cuvier compared 

 the Salamanders with the Frogs, but continued to classify them with 

 the Reptiles. That the Amphibia were entitled to independent rank 

 was emphasized in 1806 by Dumeril, who instituted the groups 

 Urodela and Anura under the French names of Anoures (Ecaudati) 

 and Urodeles (Caudati) as the two families constituting the Batrachia 

 — the latter term with the spelling Batrachii having been previously 

 introduced by A. Brongniart in 1 799. The Latin term Urodela was 

 coined by Latreille in 1825. 



Important work on the anatomy and reproductive habits of the 

 Salamander was published by Gravenhorst in 1808 and 1829. The 

 first of these is a short preliminary communication, without illustra- 

 tions, in which he refers to thirty-one figures of the anatomy of land 

 and water Salamanders which are presumably those published later 

 in the folio work. Gravenhorst's volume includes a useful examina- 

 tion of most of the preceding literature, the mistakes in which he 

 endeavours to correct, and he has very carefully revised the anatomy 

 of the gut and urogenital organs of both sexes. The drawings of the 

 latter organs are particularly good and accurate, and his figures 

 generally are faithfully drawn, and do not include any structure he 

 has not seen and closely examined. He discovered Miiller's duct in 

 the male, and shows its forward extension, but did not understand 

 how the seminal fluid reached the vas deferens, since he found no 

 direct connexion between this duct and the testis. Nor does he dis- 

 tinguish between Miiller's duct and the vas deferens, but these two 



