THE PROGRESS OF DEGRADATIOlf. 157 



gress of degradation in the great ichthyic division, — a pro- 

 gress recorded, as " with a pen of iron, in the rock for ever." 

 — and not from superficial views founded on the cartilaginous 

 or non-cartilaginous texture of the ichthyic skeleton, that the 

 standing of the kingly fishes of the earlier period is to be 

 adequately determined. Any other mode of survey, save the 

 parallel mode which takes development of brain into account, 

 evolves, we find, nothing like principle, and lands the inquirer 

 in inextricable difficulties and inconsistencies. 



In all the higher non-degraded vertebrata we find a cer- 

 tain uniform type of skeleton, consisting of the head, the ver- 

 tebral column, and four limbs ; and these last, in the various 

 symmetrical forms, whether exemplified in the higher fishes, 

 the higher reptiles, the higher birds, the higher mammals, or 

 in man himself, occur always in a certain determinate order. 

 In all the mammals, the scapular bases of the fore limbs be- 

 gin opposite the eighth vertebra from the skull backwards, 

 the seven which go before being cervical or neck vertebrae ; 

 in the birds, — a division of the vertebrata that, from their 

 peculiar organization, require longer and more flexible necks 

 than the mammals, — the scapulars begin at distances from 

 the occiput varying, according to the species, from opposite 

 the thirteenth to opposite the twenty-fourth vertebra ; and 

 in the reptiles, — a division which, according to Cuvier, " pre- 

 sents a greater diversity of forms, characters, and modes of 

 gait, than any of the other two," — they occur at almost all 

 points, from opposite the second vertebra, as in the frog, to 

 opposite the thirty-third or thirty-fourth vertebra, as in some 

 species of plesiosaurus. But in all, — whether mammals, birds, 

 or undegraded reptiles, — they are so placed, that the creatures 

 possess necks, of greater or less length, as an essential portion 

 of their general type. The hinder limbs have also in all these 

 three divisions of the animal kingdom their typical place, 

 They occur opposite, or very nearly opposite, the posterior 



