Wilder.] 168 [April 5, 



It is probable, therefore, that for the final solution of this prob- 

 lem, we must combine the visual method of Huxley, as based upon 

 the facts of position in embryo and lower animals, with the 

 intellectual method of Wyman, as based upon a great law of organi- 

 zation. This convergence of the two opposing theories of Syntropy 

 and Antitropy is indicated in our first diagram of authors, and may 

 be seen still more plainly in the preceding figure. 



In that diagram the arrows represent the longitudinal axis of 

 the body ; they look in the same direction in the lower figure, in 

 opposite directions in the upper; in the lower figure the membra of 

 the right side are shown in the position suggested by Huxley; but the 

 brace still connects pollex (P) and primus fPr.), which according to 

 syntropy are homologous parts; in the upper figure the membra are 

 turned away from each other as wholes, but the special flexures could 

 be shown only from the side; here the brace joins the minimus (Min.) 

 and primus (Pr.), which are homologous, according to antitropy. 

 The position of the membra in the one, and the idea of symme- 

 try in the other of these two figures are united in the third, where 

 the braces can join pollex and quintus, minimus and primus. 1 



II. NOMENCLATURE OF PARTS. 



The great activity of workers in homologies demands the repair 

 and, in some cases, the renewal, of their "tools of thought"; our 

 anatomical nomenclature is now as incongruous and unmanageable as 

 zoological nomenclature was before Linnseus; even our highest au- 

 thorities employ those abominable terms compounded of " fore " 

 (200, 1, 273, and 2, 281), and describe the skeleton of an ape as if 

 in the erect attitude, so as to reverse all the terms of comparison 

 with the vertebrate animal in its normal position (275, 176, note 2). 

 Special inconsistencies and objectionable features will appear in the 

 following synonymy, wherein 1 have purposely quoted, as far as possi- 

 ble, from high authorities, since upon them we must rely for effecting 



1 Since the above was written I have read such parts of 329 as discuss the rela- 

 tive positions of the membra ; but although the author well describes the iso- 

 tropy which exists in many vertebrates where the membra either project lat- 

 erally, or are rotated so as to bring the ancon and genu forward, as in tortoises, 

 and the "Heterotropie" which characterizes the membra of most other quadru- 

 peds, no direct light is thrown upon the morphical relations between the membra 

 themselves; perhaps his investigations upon the Torsion of the Humerus and 

 Femur are worth consideration. 



