104 



iication has been exclusively confided." From the date of the pub- 

 lication of this catalogue, including as it does not only the description 

 of 3790 Hunterian dissections, but also seventy- eight engravings of 

 minute and elaborate dravi'ings, together \vith the general observa- 

 tions left by Hunter, the true position of this great man in natural 

 science became manifest, and a more just and ample recognition of 

 his merits ^vas produced, particularly on the continent. 



These hovrever vreie not the only labours of Professor Owen in 

 connexion vrith his official duties. In addition to some minor cata- 

 logues and other works, I must not omit to mention the two well- 

 known monographs, the ' Memoir of the Pearly Nautilus/ pub- 

 lished under the auspices of the College in 1832; and that on the 

 skeleton of a gigantic extinct Sloth (Mylodon robustns), published 

 ten years afterwards. 



The merits of these publications are fully recognised, and have 

 received the highest praise from continental anatomists ; and it is 

 remarkable that the doubts which were expressed and long enter- 

 tained, as to the accuracy of Professor Owen's restoration of the 

 animal of the Pearly Nautilus to its shell, were completely dissipated 

 by the first complete example obtained by the eminent Professor of 

 the Garden of Plants, ^1. Valenciennes. 



Our time will only allow me to take a slight glance at the learned 

 and elaborate modification of the classification of the Cephalopoda, 

 the reference of the spirula and the curious fossil Belemnite to the 

 higher or dibranchiate order of this class of animals. For his me- 

 moir on certain of this family, with their soft parts fossilized, which 

 was published in the Philosophical Transactions for 1844, the Royal 

 !Medal was awarded. This class of animals has been still further 

 elucidated in Professor Owen's papers in the Zoological Society's 

 Transactions, and in an elaborate article in the first volume of the 

 CyclopEedia of Anatomy and Physiology. 



The first communication received by the Royal Society from Pro- 

 fessor Owen was on the Mammary Glands of the Ornithorhynchns 

 paro.doiv.s in 1S32. These organs had been originally described by 

 Sir Everard Home as masses of fat ; they were afterwards recognised 

 by ^Meckel as mammary glands in 1824 : but their true nature was 

 again disputed by Geoffroy St. Hilaire, who considered them as 

 scent glands. 



Professor Owen determined the question by obseiwing the phases 

 of change relatively between the ovaries and the glands in question, 

 and established their true mammary nature, by the dissection in 1831 

 of no less than five female Ornithorhynchi and one Echidna; a 

 doctrine, which was afterwards confirmed by observations made in 

 Australia on the secretion itself of the gland. 



In 1834 there appeared in the Pliilosophical Transactions Professor 

 Owen's paper, describing impregnated specimens of Ornithorhyn- 

 chns. In this paper he shows, by the structure of the ovisac, of 

 the corpus luteum, and of the uterine ovum, that the latter must be 

 developed la utero, and the young be born alive. He infers, from 

 the structure of the chorion, that no placenta will be developed. The 



