Historical 1 5 



published this classification with a set of new designations for the 

 principal subdivisions, but of all the terms used in his two memoirs 

 only one has survived to the present day ; the rest had a very short 

 existence. In his later paper he modified the hybrid term Setipodes 

 into the more correct Chetopodes. The families were arranged in 

 the order thus : — 



Chetopodes. Heterocriciens. Serpulides, Sabulaires. 

 Paromocriciens. Maldanies, Telethuses. 

 Homocriciens. Amphinomes, Aphrodites, Nereides, Nerei- 

 scoles, Lonibricines, Echiiirides. 



The chief point of interest in this classification is the clear 

 principle involved in the definite formation and designation of the 

 great division Chetopodes. This division had been foreshadcnved by 

 ]\Iiiller ; and Cuvier, Lamarck and Savigny had recognised, to a 

 greater or less degree, the importance of the chaetae as a divisional 

 character, but it was left to Blainville to name the division. The 

 name Chaetopoda has persisted up to the present day, for, in spite of 

 certain disadvantages which it involves, such as the wide separation 

 of earthworms and leeches, it has been found convenient as a descrip- 

 tive term to designate all those Annelids in which the lateral series 

 of chaetae form a conspicuous feature, by means of wliich these worms 

 can, with few exceptions, be readily distinguished from all other 

 animals. 



The grouping together of the Maldanies and Tek'thuses in the 

 order Paromocriciens is noteworthy. Blainville attached less value 

 than most of his contemporaries to the presence or absence of gills 

 as a systematic character, and did not hesitate to associate in one 

 order these two families, although one contains branchiate and the 

 other abranchiate Annelids, because he found them to agree in the 

 nature of their chaetae and in the similar segmentation of tlie bodv. 



In 1829 Audouin and Edwards presented to the Academic dos 

 Sciences their memoir on the classification of Annelids.' They stated 

 that they were unable to adopt the classification of either Savigny or 

 Blainville, but the one they presented was, after all, fundamentally 

 that of Savigny and similar to that of Lamarck. The morphological 

 characters used by Savigny were again employed, but in addition 

 the cirri and other soft'- appendages of the body were taken into 

 account, and thus the limits of the four orders were set forth in 



> Ann. Sci., Nat., x.xvii (1832), p. 337; also in Hist. Nat. Litt. France 

 (1834). 



- That is, soft in contrast to the chaetae. 



