I30 NATURAL SCIENCE. Feb.. 



making researches of Von Baer and Rathke in embryology ; and it is 

 precisely that unwillingness to depart from the philosophical ideas 

 of his earlier life that has led to Owen's temporary eclipse by the 

 present generation. 



This marked disregard of embryology as the essential adjunct, 

 even if not the key, of comparative anatomy, is all the more surprising, 

 since so large a proportion of Owen's researches on vertebrate animals 

 were devoted to the fossil remains of past ages. If any phase of 

 biological research can benefit by embryology, that is assuredly 

 palaeontology ; and it is strange to have to record that not only did 

 Owen fail to appreciate this fact, but that he absolutely ignored some 

 of the most striking memoirs in which an attempt is made to utilise 

 modern methods, and discover the successive stages through which 

 any particular type of animal has passed during geological time. His 

 statements on the succession of genera and species, and their possible 

 derivation one from another, were always vague, and capable of more 

 than one interpretation ; and though there is not much doubt he 

 leaned towards the views of Geoffroy St. Hiliare, and those who 

 believed in the evolution of life, his work, for the most part, is 

 eminently Cuvierian — a laborious description of the facts, with a 

 detailed discussion that rarely extends beyond strict comparative 

 anatomy and the phenomena of geographical or geological distribu- 

 tion. Only on two occasions' does he appear to have attempted any 

 broad philosophical deductions, and, even in those cases, it is not 

 quite clear how much he admits. He was perfectly well aware that 

 the facts of progression noticed by the anti-evolutionist Agassiz among 

 fishes were equally conspicuous among the higher vertebrates^ ; but 

 he contented himself with the bare statement that " the inductive 

 demonstration of the nature and mode of operation " of the laws 

 governing life would " henceforth be the great aim of the philosophical 

 naturalist." 



Owen, in fact, was Cuvier's direct successor, and apart from 

 his striking hypotheses to which Dr. Mivart has referred, 3 it is in 

 this character that he has left the deepest impression upon biological 

 science. Extending and elaborating comparative anatomy as under- 

 stood by Cuvier, Owen concentrated his efforts on utilising the results 

 for the interpretation of the fossil remains — even isolated bones and 

 teeth— of extinct animals. He never hesitated to deal with the most 

 fragmentary evidence, •♦ having complete faith in the principles 

 established by Cuvier ; and it is particularly interesting in the light 

 of present knowledge to study the long series of successes and 

 failures that characterise his work. However unwittingly, Owen may 



1 References to horse in " Anat. and Physiol. Vert.," vol. iii., p. 791 (1868), and 

 to crocodiles in Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xl., p. 157 (1884). 

 - " Palaeontology," ed. 2, p. 444 (1S61). 

 3 Natural Science, vol. ii., p. 18. 

 * Cf. Anthrakerpeton crassosteum, Owen, Geol. Mag., vol. ii., p. 6, pis. i., ii. (1865). 



