NATURAL THEOLOGY. 117 



nication with the trunk, either by a joint, or pro- 

 cess, or in any other way. It does not grow to, 

 or out of, any other bone of the trunk. It does not 

 apply to any other bone of the trunk — (I know 

 not whether this be true of any second bone in the 

 body, except perhaps the os hyoides:) in strictness, 

 it forms no part of the skeleton. It is bedded in 

 the flesh, attached only to the muscles. It is no 

 other than a foundation bone for the arm, laid in, 

 separate as it were, and distinct, from the general 

 ossification. The lower limbs connect themselves 

 at the hip with bones which form part of the skele- 

 ton ; but this connexion, in the upper limbs, being 

 wanting, a basis, whereupon the arm might be ar- 

 ticulated, was to be supplied by a detached ossifi- 

 cation for the purpose.^' 



^^ The shoulder-blade undergoes many changes, as we view it in 

 comparative anatomy. That bone which we feel running across 

 the upper part of the chest and lower part of the neck, the collar- 

 bone, is properly a process of the shoulder-blade. (See the figure 

 in the Appendix, No. 7, c. c. ) Its purpose is to hold the shoulders 

 apart, and to give strength to the arms, by throwing upon the arm 

 the action of the muscles of the chest. Accordingly, we find it in 

 climbing animals, in those which require to swing themselves by 

 the upper extremities, as the monkeys ; but in animals that have a 

 solid hoof, which implies that the anterior extremity is for the par- 

 ticular purpose of running or bounding upon the ground, not only 

 is there no occasion for that variety in the motions of the extremi's 

 ty, which is produced by the introduction of tliis bone into the skele» 

 ton of the arm, but it would be injurious — it would deprive the 

 animal of that elasticity with which it alights upon the ground. 

 Where there is no clavicle — in the horse and deer, for example, 

 the shoulder-blade, or scapula, is attached to the trunk by muscles 

 alone. Hence when the animal makes a leap, it comes down upon 



