REVIEWS 
THE BONES OF MAMMALS.* 
M R. FLOWER took the subject of the mammalian skeleton for his first 
course of lectures at the College of Surgeons. The subj ect was hardly, 
one might think, a novel one ; yet the author showed, by the number of his 
researches and the peculiar views which he expressed, that it was one in 
which, as in every other department of comparative anatomy, originality 
might be shown. But, apart from this view of the matter, we think that 
Professor Flower has done well ; for he has given the student — what he 
could not obtain before in a similarly easy manner — a sketch not only of 
the human skeleton, but also of the various forms of the mammalian type, 
which differ more or less from the human arrangement. Unlike many, 
who would have thought the skeleton of man unimportant, he places 
it first under each section, and then describes the typical forms he has 
chosen to represent the orderk of mammalia. Some may imagine that a 
book merely on the bones of mammals must be necessarily dry and unin- 
teresting. It is not so, however ; and when one remembers that in all our 
fossils we have nothing left but a congeries of bones, he sees the immense 
importance and profit derivable from such a pursuit. It is, in the opinion 
of many comparative anatomists, of no consequence at what part of the 
scale we begin, whether among the monotremata or man. But we think 
Mr. Flower is just in his conceptions on this point. He says “the structure 
of man has undoubtedly a more universal interest than that of any other 
organised being, and has therefore been more thoroughly worked out ; and, 
as the majority of terms used in describing the parts composing the bodies 
of vertebrate animals were originally bestowed on account of their form, re- 
lation, or real or fancied resemblance to some object, as they were met with 
in man, there are advantages in commencing with members of the highest 
class, and mastering their essential characters before proceeding to acquire 
knowledge of the other groups.” In this we quite agree, and although there 
are simpler forms, yet man’s osteology is so familiar to every student that 
* “ An Introduction to the Osteology of the Mammalia ; being the sub- 
stance of the course of Lectures delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons 
in 1870.” By William Henry Flower, F.R.S., F.R.C.S. London : Mac- 
millan, 1870. 
