238 CLASS XV. 



reptiles, as waa done by De Blainville, and followed by others after- 

 wards, as, for instance, C. L. Bonaparte. The name of Amphibia was 

 given to the division of the Diplopnoa, whilst that of Repjtilia was restricted 

 to the Pholidota of Mekrem or Monopnoa of Fitzinger {Ophidii, Saurii, 

 Clbelonil). 

 It appears to us that the naked or diplopnoic reptiles may be divided into three 

 natural orders, which correspond as analogous groups to the three orders of 

 scaly or haplopnoic reptiles. We have thus serpentine, lacertine and 

 chelonian Diplopnoa. This conception conducts us to a. division which 

 corresponds with that proposed by Dumeril and Bibron. 



Order I. OpMomori^lia s. Peromela. 



Feet none. Body anguiform, round, with skin ringed by trans- 

 verse wrinkles. 



Family I. Ccecilm. Characters of the order those of the single 

 family. Teeth subulate, recurved in jaws and palate. Eyes con- 

 cealed by skin, very small or indistinct. Vent almost at the ex- 

 tremity of body, tail none. 



As early as 1807 Dumeril pointed out the affinity of the genus 

 C Cecilia L. with the Batrachii; Oppel afterwards removed them to 

 this division, when pre^'ious writers had placed them with the 

 serpents. The discovery of two branchial apertures, in a young 

 specimen of Ccecilia glutinosa {liypocyanea Van Hasselt) in the 

 Leyden Musevim, by J. Mueller in 1830, has placed the natural 

 affinity of this genus beyond all doubt. The vertebrae, as in the 

 fishes and in Siren, Proteus, &c. are connected together by conical 

 cavities, which are filled with a cartilaginous or gelatinous sub- 

 stance (a remain of the chorda dorsalis). 



Compare on the Ccecilice, Schneider Hist. Amphib., Fasc. ii. pp. 359 — 388; 

 Hemprich Ccecilia ophidiorum genus recetisuit et illustravit, Verhaiidl. der 

 Gesellsch. naturforsch. Freunde zv, Berlin, 1829, s. 284 — 296; J. Mueller 

 in TiEDEMANN u. Treviranus Zeitschr. f. Physiol, iv. 2, 1832, s. 213 — 

 222, Taf. XVIII., and in his Archiv f. Physiol. 1835, s. 391 — 398, Taf. viii. 

 figs. 12 — 14. The scales were first observed by Schneider, and afterwards 

 described more particularly by Mater {Nov. Act. Acad. Cais. Leop. Car. 

 Tom. XII. p. 2; Zeitschr. fiir Physiol. III. 1829, s. 254 — 256. They are 

 wanting in Ccec. annulata) . 



Ccecilia L. 



Sp. Ccecilia (jlutinosa L., Seba Thesaur. Ii. Tab. 25, fig. 2, LiNN. Mus. Ad. 

 Frid. Tab. IV. fig. i ; very numerous annular folds, forming on the middle 

 of the abdomen an angle, which is open forwards ; dirty brown or blackish 



