ERETHIZON DORSATUM. 223 



thick, and much of the colour of the human. The right kidney was 

 somewhat the highest. The capsula renalis of the right kidney was 

 I'ounded, of the left one was oblong. The cortical substance is pretty 

 firm, yellow, and radiated ; the medullary is pulpy, and, in colour, like 

 the tubular part of the kidney. 



The heart is flat, rounded at the apex, or rather having two apices 

 very like the scrotum of a goat. There is but one vena cava superior 1 . 



The lung of the right side is larger than that of the left, with three 

 fissures dividing it into a kind of four lobes, besides the median [or 

 azygous lobe]. 



The tunica vaginalis testis communicates with the abdomen, is pretty 

 thick, and the cellular membrane that connects this coat to the rings 

 and to the external parts is so loose as to allow easily an inversion of the 

 testicle into the abdomen. This is similar to the hedge-hog, guinea- 

 pig, rat, and squirrel. The epididymis is only fixed to the testicle by 

 a thin membrane, excepting at its beginning. The prostate gland is 

 divided into two, one on each side of the urethra, and they are like the 

 branches of a tree ; there is a duct in each ramification, uniting into 

 one duct, which enters the urethra just at the caput gallinaginis. The 

 orifices of the vesiculae seminales are very large. The penis has a bone 

 in it, and is similar to that in the hare, rabbit, guinea-pig, rat, and 

 squirrel. 



The whole viscera are very loose : the mesentery is very thin : the 

 stomach can be turned from the right to the left. Some of the internal 

 intercostals arise from the vertebras of the back. The clavicles are 

 small ; one end is connected to the sternum by an elastic ligament, an 

 inch long ; the other end by a tendinous expansion. 



[The Coendou (Erethizon dorsatum, Fr. Cuv.).] 



In another porcupine, from Hudson's Bay, the clavicle was almost 

 close to the sternum. 



Of the Female Organs. — The broad ligament, or meso-cornu-uteri, at 

 the upper part is attached to the lower end of the kidney. The opening 

 of the urethra is just below the clitoris, as in the human ; so that there 

 is no length of common vagina, and no rugae in the vagina. The 

 vagina and anus make but one external opening when the parts are in 

 their natural position. There is no proper uterus : the two horns arise 

 from -the vagina as in the hare and rabbit, and terminate gradually in 



1 [In a Hystrix cristata which I dissected at the Zoological Gardens, I found two 

 vense cavse superiores. See the Prep. No. 9238, and its description in the Physiol. 

 Catalogue, 4to, vol. ii. p. 52.] 



