62 REPORT—1845. — 
ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY. 
On the Scientific Principles on which Classification in the higher Departments 
of Zoology should be based. By Wiu11am Ocitsy, F.L.S. 
Tue dental system was no doubt a valuable means of diagnosis, and this depended 
upon the fact that it had a relation to the stomach, and other viscera intended for the 
digestion of food. Just in the same way, the extremities of the mammalia, more par- 
ticularly the fore-arm, are the exponents of the habits, mental power, and ceconomy 
of animals. The fore-arm is the seat of the function of locomotion, of manipulation 
and touch. According to the real position of an animal in the scale of organization 
will be the character of its fore-arm. This position was illustrated by examples from 
the various families of mammalia. He thought that in our usual systems of zoology 
a too exclusive regard had been given to the structure and form of the teeth, 
On the Fossil Elephantine Animals of India. By Dr. Fatconer. 
In this communication, which was illustrated by diagrams of the crania, the author 
gave the results of the investigations by Captain Cautley and himself regarding the 
fossil Mastodons and Elephants of India, and endeavoured, by a series of teeth sec- 
tions, to show that there was a gradual and continuous passage in the structure of the 
teeth between the Mastodon and the Elephant, the forms which have been included 
under the name of Mastodon Elephantoides by Clift, and an undescribed Indian spe- 
cies, constituting the intermediate links. 
On the Genus Arvicola; on the Libellulidee of Europe ; on Hybrids of the 
Genus Anser. By M. Setys pe Lonecuamps, 
On the Unity of Organization as exhibited in the Skeleton of Animals, 
By Dr, Macponatp. 
All animals, even the simplest, are possessed of a central as well as peripheral or- 
ganism, varying in density as we ascend the scale, and are capable of increase by a 
repetition of segments having the primary elementary characters, As the form be- 
comes lengthened, the central portion also elongates till we have a long axis or central 
stem. This Caulis centralis in the vertebralia is the axis formed by the bodies of the 
vertebrae, which is too often improperly called the backbone. In the vertebralia the 
Caulis centralis has developed on its posterior or neural aspect a lamina on each side 
of the mesian lines, and those in the adult forms of the higher mammals are com- 
pletely ossified together in the spinous process, and also to the bodies of the vertebra. 
The author proposes to distinguish three parts or divisions in each lamina, most 
easily traced in the membranal lamine. 
I. Protomeral.—Single (simplex), orbicular, or when elongated, the shaft having 
convex or round extremities, Brachium, Femur, 
II. Deutomeral_—Generally double (duplex) ; the shaft having concave extremities, 
and its proximal extremity more or less elongated into an olecranon. 
Ill. Zritomeral.—Manifold (multiplex), terminal, orbicular ; as in the carpus and 
tarsus and digital termination. 
Mons. Selys de Longchamps explained in French, at some length, the object which 
the Academy of Brussels had had in view in obtaining accurate dates for the appear- 
ance, pairing, building, &c. of birds, the migration of fishes, the budding, flowering, 
&c, of plants. By connecting these with meteorological phenomena, we might arrive 
at an expression of the cause of the phenomena observed. 
