Page 291. 
414 ON THE MUSK-DEER. 
drawn special attention to the nature of the internal surface of the 
uterus in the Order, having given strong reasons for the surmise that 
the Cavicornia are characterized by having numerous cotyledons on 
the placenta, on which account they are termed Polycotyledontophora, 
whilst in the Cervide (therefore termed Oligocotyledontophora), the 
cotyledons are very few in number. It occurred to me that the nature 
of the interior of the uterus or the placenta would throw much light 
on the very disputed point as to the affinities of Moschus. Of the 
placenta Pallas tells us* that “‘cotyledones et respondentes placentule 
oblonga, plana figura gaudent et in series fere digeruntur. Extrema 
secundinarum attenuata, in cornua uteri filo protensa; at versus 
orificiam uteri chorion utriusque anastomosi tubulari coheret.” At 
the same time he tells us that there were two foetuses in the uterus. 
Prof. Fower has kindly allowed me to examine the uterus of the 
specimen of Moschus moschiferus in the College-of-Surgeons Museum, 
which was about 24 years old. From it fig. 4is taken. It will be 
Fig. 4. 
Uterus of Moschus moschiferus : the left cornu is opened up 
longitudinally. 
seen that there are no cotyledonary papille at all, the mucous 
membrane being disposed in narrow longitudinal folds, six in number, 
of very little depth, running nearly the whole length of the cornua, 
slightly broken here and there, but nowhere developing from their free 
edges the tongue-like processes which form the cotyledonary papille 
in ordinary Deer, or the characteristic linearly arranged elevations 
* Loe. cit. p. 41, 
a 
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