REVIEWS—PALZONTOLOGY, ETC. 539 
form of an octavo volume, containing all the original illustrations, 
together with a classified index, and other additional matters. 
The work, as implied by the author in its title, is essentially of a 
synoptical character—the treatment indeed, within the scope of a 
single volume, of so extended a subject as that of paleeontology, must 
necessarily be so—but the condensation has been performed with no 
ordinary judgment, and a far greater amount of information is 
contained in the volume, than one might at first thought be led to 
expect. This applies more especially to the Vertedrata, to which 
series about three-fourths of the work are devoted. In his introductory 
remarks to the class of fishes, Professor Owen takes exception to the 
whole (and strong exception to the greater number) of Pander’s new 
genera from the Silurian formations of Russia. The so-called ‘ cono- 
donts,” considered by Dr. Pander to be fish teeth, appear to Professor 
Owen (as the result of careful microscopic examination) to be the hook- 
lets or denticles of naked mollusks or annelids, But whatever the fossil 
bodies in question may prove to be, all earnest inquirers must agree with 
Professor Owen in his remarks, that, “the formal publication of these 
minute ambiguous bodies of the oldest fossiliferous rocks, as proved 
evidences of fishes is much to be deprecated.” Sooner or later, 
palzontologists will be forced to unite and adopt a fixed resolution to 
disallow all determinations (with their consequent nomenclature) 
whether referring to higher groups or to genera and species, founded 
on fragmentary or incomplete evidence. Without some united action of 
this kind, that daily-augmenting evil, the accumulation of synonymes, 
bids fair to acquire, before long, unmanageable proportions; whilst 
the false reasonings and deductions flowing from these uncertain 
determinations, and widening as they flow, constitute, if possible, a 
still more serious obstacle to true progress. Talleyrand’s celebrated 
admonition—‘“ pas de zéle”’ should, in one sense at least, be admitted 
as an axiom into paleontological inquiries. 
The class Reptilia is subdivided by Professor Owen into thirteen 
orders (including the batrachians,) in accordance with his recent 
views, as developed in a paper on the subject before the meeting of 
the British Association at Aberdeen*. This classification, although 
at first sight a somewhat complicated one, will be found greatly 
conducive to a just conception of the relations existing between the 
varied forms of reptilian structure. It commences with the order 
* See the present volume of the Canadian Journal, page 73. 
