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in that country, and in France. It seems to 

 have been entertained first with respect to the 

 several bones comprising the skeleton of the 

 vertebral animals. It was observed that all the 

 essential parts comprising a vertebra, or one of 

 the bones of the spine its body, processes and 

 canals were to be found in the posterior bone 

 of the skull, that the same presented themselves 

 again in the bones forming the central parts of 

 the skull, and a third time in those of which its 

 anterior part was composed ; the skull, therefore, 

 was considered to consist essentially of three 

 vertebrae, however dissimilar it might be in its 

 general aspect. And it is only in man and the 

 higher tribes of animals that even this dissimi- 

 larity is striking : -in the lowest family of fishes 

 the vertebrae and bones of the skull are, not only 

 essentially, but very obviously analogous to each 

 other; and the transition from these through 

 reptiles, birds, and quadrupeds, up to man, is, 

 with respect to these bones, so gradual, that 

 any analogy which we admit in the first case 

 must be extended to the last also. There was 

 thus then a kind of unity of organic structure 

 established between parts at first view very dif- 

 ferent from each other ; and the same idea of a 

 unity of organization was subsequently extended 

 to all the other bones, the prototype, as it were, 

 of every one in the body being met with in either 

 a vertebra or a rib. Thus the bones comprising 

 the upper jaw were discovered to be nothing 

 more than the transverse processes of some of 



