328 LEADING AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



phytogeny of fishes are contained in the syllabus of his university 

 lectures in 1897. 



Passing to the amphibians it may be said that his studies in 

 this branch of natural history are included in more than forty 

 papers. These began with one on the Salamandridse written in 

 1859. The classification of the Anura received his attention in 

 1865 and 1866 when he outlined the larger Ecaudate or Anurous 

 divisions, namely, the Aglossa; the Bufomformia; the Arcifera; 

 and the Raniformia. It was also in 1865 that he described the 

 fossil amphibamus grandiceps from the Carboniferous of Ohio. 

 This was his first extinct amphibian. Soon after, turning to the 

 classification of the amphibians, he proposed the order of Stego- 

 cephali to include the labyrinthodonts and smiliar great monsters 

 of the past. This order has been universally adopted. From the 

 Coal Measures of Ohio and the Permian deposits of Texas he 

 obtained many new forms of fossil amphibians which he described 

 and classified, and in 1884 he published the "Batrachia of the 

 Permian Period of North America," in which he summed up his 

 previous contributions. He must also be credited with the " Check 

 List of North American Batrachia and Reptilia" (1875) and with 

 "The Batrachia of North America" (1899) which he contributed 

 to the series of Bulletins published by the U. S. National Museum. 

 The former includes a systematic list of the higher groups and 

 also an essay on geographical distribution. The latter forms a 

 volume of over 500 pages with 120 text figures and 86 full page 

 plates. In it " 107 species are recognized and these are distributed 

 under 31 genera." According to Dr. George Baur of the Univer- 

 sity of Chicago: "There never has been a naturalist who has pub- 

 lished so many papers upon the taxonomy, morphology and pale- 

 ontology of the Amphibia and Reptilia as Professor Cope." 



His studies of the reptiles developed largely in connection with 

 his western explorations, and according to Osborn may be grouped 

 as: "First, his treatment of the reptiles of the Bridger and other 

 fresh-water Tertiary lakes in connection with the mammalian 

 fauna; second, the continuation of his systematic description of 

 the Kansas Cretaceous fauna; third, the brief papers upon the 



