404 Mr. G. R. Waterhouse on the Classification of Mammalia. 



time back the section Marsupiata was regarded by many as an 

 unnatm-al assemblage of species which in reaUty belonged to 

 other orders or groups ; and on this ])oint Prof. Owen observes, 

 " It may be admitted, that at the period when the most judicious 

 and learned natm-alist, the then Vice-secretary of the Zoological 

 Society, published his reasons for rejecting the Marsupialia as a 

 distinct group in the ' Systema Mammalium,' and for distributing 

 them among different placental orders, according to their sup- 

 posed closer affinities, the contrary views set forth by M. de 

 Blainville were defective in that kind of evidence which could 

 alone render them convincing. The organization of the IMarsu- 

 pial animals was not at that time sufficiently elucidated to render 

 any opinion as to theii- natural affinities really vahd. Subsequent 

 dissections have however shown, that the hypothesis which Cuvier 

 had sanctioned by his authority was correct. The Marsupial 

 animals have been proved to agree among themselves, and to 

 differ from the analogous placental species by several important 

 modifications not suspected when the Mammalia in the museum 

 of the Zoological Society were arranged according to the quinary 

 system *." 



Here we have a case, which, though it goes beyond my propo- 

 sition, will serve to illustrate the impression which I wish to con- 

 vey : various jMarsupial animals, which are now all but universally 

 admitted to form a natural group, have been supposed (when 

 materials for forming a just conclusion were not at hand) to be 

 members of other gi-eat divisions of the Mammalia. 



Mr. Bennett asks, " "W'hat is there of importance in the struc- 

 ture of the Wombat, except this solitaiy character of the Marsu- 

 pium, to separate it from the Rodent order ? " But fm-ther in- 

 formation of the Wombat is acquii'ed ; it is found to possess some 

 other characters in common ^\dth the other Marsupiata. " Surely 

 the different groups of animals are imperceptibly linked together," 

 might then have been the remark ; or, it might have been disco- 

 vered that other animals possessing the pouch approached very 

 nearly to this supposed Rodent on the one hand and to the car- 

 nivorous Marsupials on the other, and the same remark might 

 have been uttered. ^^Tiat said Cuvier in 1839 relating to this 

 same animal ? — " That it is a true Rodent as regards its dentition 

 and intestines, its only relation to the Carnivora being evinced 

 in the articulating portion of the lower jaw; and in a rigorously 

 exact system it would be necessary to place it with the Rodentia; 

 we should, in fact, have there arranged it, if we had not been led 

 to the Wombat by a regular uninterrupted series fi'om the Opos- 

 su.ms to the Phalangers, from them to the Kangaroos, and from 



* Ti-ans. Zool. Soc. vol. ii. part iv. p. 330. 



