2 
To his professorial work he throughout gave the utmost devotion. He was 
an excellent lecturer, and took special interest in the practical work carried 
on by his students. 
Bridge was closely connected with the Birmingham Natural History Society 
and Philosophical Society, of both of which he filled the office of Vice-President, 
becoming the first President of the amalgamated Societies in 1894. He 
proceeded to the degree of Sc.D. (Cambridge) in 1896, and became a Fellow of 
the Royal Society in 1903. The degree of M.Sc. was conferred on him by the 
new University of Birmingham in 1901. 
Bridge’s scientific work all lay within a narrow compass. He was 
essentially a Morphologist, and his original papers refer to Fishes, especially 
to those which are usually regarded as occupying a low place in the Piscine 
series. He was thus particularly attracted to the “Ganoids” ( a name which 
is now used in a somewhat more restricted sense than that in which he was 
accustomed to use it), to the Dipnoi and to the Siluroids, Osteoglossum and 
Notopterus among the Teleostei. “Let it be distinctly understood that the 
only sound foundation for scientific ichthyology is a profound comparative 
anatomy, and especially osteology of all the genera.” These words, by 
Dr. T. Gill,* well express what may be supposed to have been Bridge’s guiding 
motive throughout his work, which was always a judicious mixture of 
description and comparison of the structure of well-selected forms of Fishes. 
During his residence at Cambridge he took up, jointly with his friend 
Mr. A. C. Haddon, the study of the remarkable relations that exist between the 
air-bladder and the auditory organ in the Siluride, as in certain other families 
of Teleostei which are grouped together as Ostariophysi. This resulted in a 
paper published in the ‘ Proceedings of the Royal Society’ in 1889 and ina 
voluminous memoir which appeared in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions’ in 
1893. It was unfortunate, for various reasons, that the publication of this 
Memoir had been so long delayed. 
The anatomical relations which form the subject of this joint paper are of no 
little interest. They were first described in 1820 by Weber, who showed that — 
in the Silurides and Cyprinide a short chain of bones intervenes, on either side, 
between the anterior part of the air-bladder and the auditory organ, and 
regarded the air-bladder as thus accessory to the function of hearing. Bridge 
and Haddon, depending to a considerable extent on a part which had been 
purchased of Dr. Bleekev’s well-known collection of East Indian Fishes, added 
greatly to our knowledge of the “ Weberian ossicles” in the Siluride. No less 
than 100 species, referred to 51 genera, were examined. The view that the 
fishes possessing these ossicles are related to one another was fully confirmed, 
since the agreement throughout the Ostariophysi in regard to the ossicles is 
too detailed to permit of explanation on any other theory. The Weberian 
mechanism includes modifications of the auditory organ, of the air-bladder, 
and of the anterior part of the vertebral column. The axial skeleton in this 
* ‘Science’ (N.S8.), vol. 21, 1905, p. 661. 


