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REPORT ON ZOOLOGY, MDCCCXLIV.

own author, will certainly play no further jest with any one else. Thenumber live is for Kaup the bed of Procrustes ; when the body to be laidupon this is too large or long, he shortens it, and when too short, unmer-cifully stretches it; so that our author may well glory in such adroit dealings:while he observes, “ that hitherto no exception has occurred to me whichmight detract from the validity of the number 5, and I challenge Zoologistsat large to point me such an one out.” If we look into the details of thisschematism, we are everywhere met by great capriciousness of arrangement.Thus e. g. the Rodentia , Insectivora , Marsupialia , Cheiroptera, and sub-species of Quadrumana have been thrown together into a single order, theCarnivora united with the Cetacea ; among Birds the entire work of Nitzsch,with all its great results, has been left disregarded. Readily as we acknow-ledge the merit and importance of Kaup’s palaeontological contributions, thework now before us must, on the contrary, be declared a failure in its design.All further discussion will be therefore deferred, until the large museums ofanimated nature bestir themselves to dispose their Mammalia and Birdsaccording to the new classification.

Of a different kind from the above is the SystematischeVerzeichniss aller bis jetzt bekannten Saiigtbiere, oderSynopsis Mammalium nach dem Cuvierschen Systeme vonDr. Heinrich Seliinz; Soloth, 1844, vol. i.

The arrangement of Cuvier is taken for a basis, and in conformity there-with the orders of Apes , Bats , Rapacious quadrupeds, and Marsupials aretreated of in the first book. The fabrication of such a synopsis can at pre-sent. occasion no great difficulty, when we have before us the publishedlabours of Schreber , with, furthermore, the excellent monography of Water-house on the Marsupialia , and that of Nilsson on the Seals . There is nothingnew to be found in this synopsis ; even the previous literature might havebeen examined among other things more closely. Thus, e. g., scarcely anyreference has been made to the superlative work of Nitzsch; so that thespecies of Seals have not been properly arranged by Seliinz. Plioca probos-eidea and cristata, which in their entire structure obviously approximateeach other, have been removed to the two extremities of the genus.After Phoca vitulina and caspica directly follows Ph . barbata; but thencomes the Ph . annellata: a mode of arrangement that is utterly at fault,since the Ph . barbata differs in the condition of the dented system, cra-nium, vibrissse, and feet, so strikingly from the three other species, whichpresent the highest amount of similarity to each other, that it cannot pro-perly find a place amongst them. The critical examination, bestowed byNitzsch upon the genus Otaria, is completely overlooked, so that a numberof nominal species are still figured. In treating of the genus Nasua, Seliinz