Abstract
The council of the Victoria Institute having done me the honour of asking me to contribute a Paper, I have adopted a suggestion, for which I am indebted to your esteemed Honorary Secretary, Captain Petrie, and venture to lay before you a defence of the views which I am know to hold, in accordance with those of Cuvier and Owen, but in opposition to the prevailing fashion of the last thirty years, with regard to the classification of that large and most important division of animals, the Vertebrata.