HISTOKY OF OPHIOLGOY. 
119 
cessors have taken care to make extracts from him in their 
works. 
Of all the figures which have appeared to this day on 
the natural history of animals, those which are found in 
the Grand Work on Egypt are beyond dispute the most 
perfect, for the fidelity with which the subjects are repre- 
rented. The explanatory text of these plates has only 
been recently published, and still only comprehends the 
first part ; the objects represented in the supplement by 
Savigny having been lost. 
A novel classification of reptiles, at first inserted in the 
Annals of Natural Sciences, has been separately published 
at Munich in 1811. The author, the late M. Oppel, dif- 
fers much from his predecessors. In adopting the four 
orders established by Brongxiart, he has introduced 
numerous modifications ; as in reuniting the Saurians and 
Ophidians, as subdivisions of his order Squamata; in ar- 
ranging the Anguis among the Saurians, and placing, 
according to the remarks of M. Dumeril, the Cseciha in 
the order of Batrachians. This system, more natural by 
its connection than any other published, has only been 
appreciated in our days. We owe to the late Oppel the 
establishment of several very natural genera, such as Tor- 
trix, Trigonocephalus, Vipera, &c. ; but he has introduced 
confusion into the system by reuniting the Bungarus under 
the general denomination of Pseudo-Boa, while he applies 
the first name to the Dipsas. The seven families which he 
has created for the subdivision of Ophidians, are founded 
on too small a number of observations to be useful at this 
time of day. Some are even very little natural ; for exam- 
ple, that of Pseudo -Vipera, comprehending the genera 
Acrochordus and Herpeton ; and the Viperinse, in which 
the Vipera, Bungarus, and Naja, &c. are united. 
I now arrive at the labours of Cuvier on Serpents. 
Founded on observations first inserted in his Comparative 
Anatomy, this illustrious philosopher published, in 1817,, 
a classification of serpents^ of which we shall give a sketch : 
it was reproduced in a second edition, and has undergone 
Regne Animal, vol. ii. ed. 21e. 
