File:The Cambridge natural history (1895) (20776656771).jpg

Title: The Cambridge natural history
Identifier: cu31924024535522 (find matches)
Year: 1895 (1890s)
Authors: Harmer, S. F. (Sidney Frederic), Sir, 1862- ed; Shipley, A. E. (Arthur Everett), Sir, 1861-1927. ed
Subjects: Zoology
Publisher: (London, Macmillan and Co. , Limited; New York, The Macmillan Company
Contributing Library: Cornell University Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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I lO FOSSIL ECHIDNAS many other mammals." In Echidna, too, but not in Ornitho- rhynchus, the hemispheres are well convoluted, though the arrange- ment of these convolutions cannot be brought into line with what is known concerning the convolutions upon the hemispheres of other mammals. It had been stated that in these animals, at least in Echidna, there were only two optic lobes, as in lower vertebrates, instead of the mammalian four. The late Sir AV. H. Flower set this matter at rest,^ and showed that Echidmi was in this respect typically mammalian. The absence of the corpus callosum is one of the principal features separ- atino- the Monotremes from other mammals. The Monotremata are repre- sented to-day by two types, Ornitho- rhyncluis and Echidna, which are no doubt worthy of l)eing placed in separate families. Fossil remains of the group (apart from the prob- lematical Multituberculata) are only known from rieistoceue times in Australia, and consist of the bones of a large species of Echidna, and some fragments of Ornithorhynclius, indicating a smaller animal than the living Platypus. Fam. 1. Echidnidae.—This family contains two genera, of which Echidna is the older and much the better known. The skin is abundantly covered with spines, with which are mingled hairs. The snout is tapering, the tail rudimentary, and the fingers and toes five in number. The spur and glaud upon the calcaneum are smaller than iu Ornithorhynchits. The claws are very strong, serving to tear open the ants' nests, upon the inhabitants of which the Echidna feeds, licking them up with a long extensile tongue like that of Myriaeco'iiluiga. In relation to this habit the salivary glands are enormously developed, and indeed the animal has been con- founded with Myrmecophaga," as the vernacular name " Australian Anteater " exemplifies. 1 Proc. Zool. Soc. 1861, p. 18. ^ Myrviecoiiliaga. acuhata was the name given hy Shaw.
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Fig. 5.3.—Brain of Ei-hidiia aciileata, dorsal view. (Nat. size.) (From Parlver and Haswell's Zoology.)

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