554 eeport — 1878. 



up by Cuvier into the orders Carnivora and Insectivora, and the genus Didelphys, in- 

 cluded in it by Linnaeus, has been since by universal assent removed to another group. 



The first six genera belong to the very well-defined and probably natural group 

 now called Carnivora. The one placed at the head of the list, Phoca, is equivalent 

 to the large and important modern sub-order Pinnipedia, the walrus, however, 

 though essentially a seal, having been, as before mentioned, relegated by Linnaeus 

 to another order, on account of its aberrant dentition. But three species are recorded 

 in the genus : P. ursina, the sea-bear of the North Pacific (now Otaria wsina) } 

 P. leonina, founded on Anson's sea-lion, now commonly called the elephant seal, 

 or sea-elephant (Macrorhimts proboscideus, or more properly leoninus) ; and 

 P. vitulina, the common seal of our coasts. 



The terrestrial sub-order of Carnivora is represented by five genera : 1. Canis, 

 including the dog, wolf, hyaena, fox, arctic fox, jackal, &c. 2. Felis, with only six 

 species, but still one of the few Linnaean genera, which covers exactly the same 

 ground as at present in the opinion of the majority of zoologists, although it may 

 be mentioned as an example of the tendency towards excessive and unnecessary 

 multiplication of generic names which exists in some quarters, that it has been 

 divided into as many as fourteen. 3. Viverra, a heterogeneous group, containing 

 ichneumons, coatis, and skunks, animals belonging to three very distinct families, 

 according to modern ideas. 4. Mustela, a far more natural group, being nearly 

 equivalent to the modern family Mustelidce ; and, lastly, a very comprehensive genus 

 TJrsus, consisting of U. meles, the badger, U. lotor, the racoon, U. luscus, 

 the wolverene, and all the true bears known, comprised in the single species 

 U. arctos. Many interesting forms of Carnivora, as Cryptoprocta, Proteles, JEuplexes, 

 Ailums, and Ailwropus-, have no place in the Linnaean system, being comparatively 

 modern discoveries. The very recent date (1869) at which the last-named remark- 

 able animal was made known to science by the enterprising researches of the Abbe 

 David into the Fauna of Eastern Thibet, gives hope that we may not yet be at the 

 end of the discovery of even large and hitherto unsuspected forms of existing 

 mammals. 



Next in the Linnaean system comes the genus Didelphys, constituted for the 

 reception of five species of American opossums. This is a very interesting landmark 

 in the history of the progress of the knowledge of the animal life of the world, as 

 these five opossums, forming a genus in the midst of the order Fek^:, were all that 

 was then known of the great sub-class Marsupialia, now constituting a group 

 entirely apart from the ordinary members of the class. It is difficult now to 

 imagine an animal world without kangaroos, without wombats, without phalangers, 

 without thylacines, without dasyures, and so many other familiar forms, and yet 

 such was the animal world known to Linnaeus. It is true that a species of 

 kangaroo from one of the islands of the Austro-Malayan Archipelago was described 

 as long ago as 1714 by De Bruyn, who saw it alive at the house of the Dutch 

 governor of Batavia, and that Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks saw and killed 

 kangaroos on the east coast of Australia in 1770, and had published figures and 

 descriptions of them in 1773, or five years before the death of Linnaeus, but .the 

 work we are now considering contains no traces of knowledge of the existence of 

 such a remarkable and now so well-known animal. 



The three remaining genera of Ferj5, Talpa, Sorex, and Erinaceus, contained 

 all the known species of the present order Insecttvora, which now embraces many 

 and very varied forms, quite unsuspected a century ago, and to which it is probable 

 that others will be added by the time the exploration of the animal products of the 

 world is completed. 



The fourth order, Glikes, has remained practically unchanged to our day, 

 although the name Rodentia has generally superseded that bestowed upon it by 

 Linnaeus. The five genera of the Systema Natures, Hystrix, Lepus, Castor, Mm, 

 and Sciurus, have been vastly increased, partly by subdivision and partly by the 

 discovery of new forms. Noctilio is, as before mentioned, removed to the Chiroptera, 

 but its loss is well compensated for by Hydrochcerus, the well-known Capybara, 

 the largest existing member of the group, which in the Linnaean system is placed 

 among the Belluae, in the same genus with the pigs. 



