402 Harris Ha^\i;horne Wilder 



ffard to the methods of investioation from a series obtained from the dif- 

 ferent members of a phylogenetic series, although it must be borne in 

 mind that a deformity in either case must seriously vitiate the conclusions 

 and must never be used so long as an undeformed specimen is available. 

 Of course, as explained in the introduction, deformation is far more fre- 

 quent in the abnormal than in the normal, and to avoid this it may be 

 necessary in a given case to select embryonic stages, which increases enor- 

 mouslv the difl&culty in obtaining material, yet any one who has the plea- 

 sure of investigating undeformed cosmobiotic monsters will constantly 

 forget that he is dealing with the abnormal, and be as eager for the 

 interpretation derived from comparison as any comparative anatomist 

 when he turns to a new animal species that represents another stage in 

 phylogenetic development. 



Although the anatomy of monsters, especially the osteology, has been 

 studied more or less for a long time, and although in some few cases a 

 comparison of internal parts has been done, the recognition of the study 

 of the comparative teratology of cosmobiotic monsters as a legitimate 

 part of biological investigation seems not to have been previously empha- 

 sized, and, like other new branches of inquiry, would be greatly benefited 

 bv a distinctive name. To emphasize the value of studying these forms 

 in series, that is, the similarity of this line of research to comparative 

 anatomy and embryology, I would like to call it the study of Terato- 

 genesis, and speak of the different stages as represented by the different 

 cases as ieratogenetic, but these terms seem to have been already em- 

 ployed with reference to the causes which may have produced monsters, 

 or even as the science of the artificial production of monsters. The 

 phrase "comparative teratology" cannot be used, since it is ambiguous, 

 and may refer to all sorts of monsters. It is also occasionally used in 

 the sense of the study of monsters among the other animals, as distinct 

 from human monsters.^*^ This leaves us no words to express either the 

 study as confined to Cosmobia, the series formed by related Cosmobia, 

 or the separate stages of such a related series, and thus with some hesita- 

 tion and because the need is great I may suggest for the study of Cosmo- 

 bia in general {i. e., the comparative study of both normal and abnormal 

 forms) the word Cosmobiology, and for the series formed by related 

 Cosmobia the word Cos:\[OBIOGEXEsis, with tbe adjective form Cosmo- 



^"Cf. the review of Mall's paper in the section on the literature at the end of 

 this paper. 



