On the formation and arrangement of a dental museum : with a proposed dental classification of the placental Mammalia / by Robert T. Hulme.

  • Hulme, Robert Thomas
Date:
[1869]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the formation and arrangement of a dental museum : with a proposed dental classification of the placental Mammalia / by Robert T. Hulme. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    they cannot be said, at least in the present state of our knowledge, to lead to sufficiently uniform and definite results; nor have they, any more than the cerebral characters, been generally accepted. There is one very obvious and practical objec- tion to the adoption of such anatomical and structural peculiarities as a basis of classification, namely, that in the case of a newly discovered animal it is only after careful dissection we can positively assert in which group, or subdivision, it should be placed. In the case of the placental classification, this involves the dissection of the impregnated female. The more easily a character can be ascertained and recognised, the more permanent and en- during its nature, the more intimate and exten- sive its connection with the general structure of the animal, the better it is adapted for the pur- poses of the comparative anatomist, the naturalist and the paleontologist. No part of the animal possesses these qualities in a greater degree than the teeth; and with these advantages it remains to be seen whether they can be employed for the purpose of grouping together the different orders of the placental division of the Mammalia in a convenient and natural manner. I have endeavoured to do this by dividing the Placentalia into three groups or sub-divisions, to m.] L