30 



[Jan 17, 



Publication. 



Daniel G. Brinton, George H. Horn, Samuel Wagner, 



Patterson DuBois, Horace Jayne. 



Michaux Legacy. 



Thomas Meehan, J. Sergeant Price, Aubrey H. Smith, 



William M. Tilghman, Isaac Burk. 



Hall. 

 J. Sergeant Price, William A. Ingham, Charles A. Oliver. 



Library. 



Edwin J. Houston, William V. McKean, Wm. John Potts, 



Jesse Y. Burk, William H. Greene. 



Henry M. Phillips'' Prize Essay Fund. 



Richard Vaux, Henry Phillips, Jr., William V. McKean, 



Furman Sheppard, Joseph C. Fralev, 



and 



The President of the Society, ] 



The Treasurer of the Society, J 



Dr. Harrison Allen made an oral communication on 

 Variations of the Forms of Human Teeth." 



The 



He stated that monocuspidate teeth are those which first appear in any 

 given series, and that the hicuspidate and the multicuspidate forms are 

 complications due to additions to the monocuspidate. He claimed that the 

 quadritubercular human molar resolves itself into two pairs of adjoined 

 cusps which are arranged endo-ectally, and not as he at one time stated* 

 into a tritubercular form to which is appended a rudimental fourth cusp, 

 lie also believed that teeth when degenerated do not of necessity descend 

 along the lines of ascent. As a rule they infrequently do so. In his 

 opinion, degenerated teeth (and these were illustrated from the orders of 

 Cheiroptera, Rodentia, and Primates) are all essentially alike, inasmuch 

 as they exhibit losses of characteristic details, while retaining the lateral 

 thickenings and contour lines. Some of these may be mimetic of the true 

 tritubercular molar. It is necessary to remember, that forms of teeth 

 when passing into degeneration are in reality expressions of teratological 

 phenomena and have little or no taxonomic value. 



* "Dental Cosmos," December, 1874. 



