INTRODUCTION. 93 



perhaps, not even in the monotremata, both orders 

 being almost exclusively from Australia, barely half 

 explored, it follows, that their classification into a 

 regular series of families, genera, and species, must 

 still be only provisional. These modifications, we 

 think, Baron Cuvier would have himself adopted, 

 had he lived to acquire the additional information 

 the science has -since obtained. We have, therefore, 

 with his distribution and dismemberments, the trans- 

 positions rendered necessary by an appropriate loca- 

 tion of the implacentals, according to Professor Owen, 

 a system which produces the following order : 



VERTEBRATA. 



MAMMALIA. 



I. Sub-class. Placentalia. 



Order I. Bimana (Eationalia.) MAN ! privileged 

 in every other aspect, is zoologically distin- 

 guished by possessing hands on the anterior 

 extremities alone ; while the hinder extremities 

 are destined solely to sustain him in walking. 

 The order which comes nearest to him is 



Order II. That of Quadrumana, having hands on 

 the four extremities, with thumbs free, and 

 opposable on all. Monkeys and lemurs. 



Order III. Next is the aberrant order of Cheirop- 

 tera, with pectoral mamma?, &c., like the for- 

 mer, but having a fold of the skin connecting 

 the sides of the neck, with all the limbs and 



