CORRESPONDENCE. | 383 
I hope, if spared, to be able to continue writing about our 
insects, but I also hope that I shall never write about the work done 
by other naturalists in the same style as that adopted by Dr. Sharp 
towards mine. 
I am, &ce., 
| THos. Broun. 
Howick, Auckland, 
27th November, 1884. 
P.S.—The italics are mine.—T. B. 
EMBRYOLOGY OF MONOTREMES. 
S1r,—In your “General Notes” published in the “Journal ” for 
January, 1885, | observe you have quoted that which had been pre- 
viously published in Sydney, and contradicted by a letter from me in 
the Sydney Morning Herald, “that Dr. Bennet and others tenaciously 
held to the theory that these animals were viviparous.” In my first 
account of the habits, &c., of this smgular mammal (Ornithorhynchus), 
published in 1834 in the first volume of the Transactions of the 
Zoological Society of London (and in which I gave an engraving of 
the animals in various positions, drawn from life, and also the first 
representation of their burrows), I stated that they would probably 
be eventually found to be ovo-viviparous, and inall my later commu- 
nications on the subject, [ have always expressed the same opinion, 
and this was entertained by many others; but I do not recollect one 
opinion being expressed that they were viviparous. 
I also formed my opinion of its oviparous, or ovo-viviparous 
nature, considering the latter most probable, from having, in 1832, 
found the loose ova in the uterus; and at that time stated to residents 
in Sydney that if it was not found to be oviparous, it would be certain 
to be ovo-viviparous. These ova were described and figured by Prof. 
Owen, in the Transactions of the Royal Society, in 1834. 
Always regarding this paradoxical animal, from my earliest 
acquaintance with it, and from its anatomical structure, to be a link 
in creation between the bird and reptile, I more readily came to the 
conclusion that it would probably be found to be ovo-viviparous. 
I was highly gratified when that distinguished embryologist Mr. 
Caldwell, solved this biological problem. Up to the present time, 
for many years, in conjunction with my son (Mr. G. Bennett) at’ 
Queensland, we have endeavoured to discover the generation of the 
Monotremes; and some of the results are embodied in a paper by my 
friend Sir R. Owen, and which he has just sent me, “On the description 
of an Impregnated Uterus and of the Uterine Ova in Echidna 
| hystrix,” published in the Annals of Natural History for December, 
' 1884. I must conclude, in the language of Sir R. Owen, to add “an 
expression of thankfulness to see solved, mainly by Mr. Caldwell’s 
persevering researches, a biological problem which I have sought to 
determine since 1832.” 
Sydney, I am, &e., 
5th February, 1885. GEORGE Bennett, M.D. 
