PALEONTOLOGY. 415 



Reptiles. As early as the year 1812, Cuvier had given a full 

 exposition of all reptiles known up to that date, and had 

 elucidated in a masterly manner the osteology of the Ichthyo- 

 saurians, Plesiosaurians, Crocodiles, Mosasaurians, Lizards, 

 Tortoises, and Pterodactyles. And as the systematic arrange- 

 ment of living reptiles had already reached a standard of 

 security, the fossil discoveries could the more easily be grouped 

 according to their apparent affinities. In the year 1830, Von 

 Meyer made the first attempt at a systematic classification 

 of living and fossil reptiles. Meyer consigned all fossil reptiles, 

 with the exception of tortoises and serpents, to the Saurians, 

 and sub-divided the Saurians into Dactylopoda, Nexipoda, 

 Pachypoda, Pterodactyli, and Labyrinthodonti. 



This classification was soon changed by Owen. 1 This great 

 anatomist opened his magnificent series of researches on fossil 

 reptiles in the year 1839; his works on this subject extend 

 over a period of fifty years, and have been a source of remark- 

 able scientific progress. Owen erected a number of orders of 

 fossil reptiles, and gave to them an equal value with the orders 

 of living reptiles. His systematic sub-division, with a few 

 changes afterwards introduced by Huxley, Cope, Marsh, and 

 Baur, has retained its authoritative position to the present day. 

 All fossil reptiles occurring in Great Britain were described by 

 Owen in a long and profusely illustrated series of monographs 

 published in the volumes of the Palseontographical Society; he 

 also examined and described the remarkable reptilian remains 

 from the Karroo formation in South Africa. 



Meyer supplied an exhaustive account of all reptiles 

 occurring in Germany. This indefatigable palaeontologist 

 published four large monographs of the fossil Saurians between 

 1847 and 1860, and in addition contributed many other 

 memoirs, illustrated by his own drawings, to the volumes of 



1 Sir Richard Owen, born on the 2oth July 1804, in Lancaster, studied 

 medicine, and especially surgery, in Edinburgh and London; became in 

 1828 assistant at the College of Surgeons in London, and in 1834 Professor 

 of Comparative Anatomy. The Geological Society in 1838 presented the 

 Wollaston medal to the young scientist, and in 1857 he was chosen Presi- 

 dent of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. In the 

 year 1856 he resigned his Professorship at the College of Surgeons, and 

 accepted the post of a Director of the British Museum. In 1881 the 

 Natural History Collections were transferred to the new buildings at South 

 Kensington, and Sir Richard Owen was director of that department. He 

 died on the i8th December 1892. 



