XVII. On the blood-vessels of mustelus antarcticus: a contribution to the morphology of the vascular system in the vertebrata

• Published in: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: The Royal Society 1886
• Subjects: Huxley; Antarc*; antarcticus
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstl.1886.0018; https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rstl.1886.0018

The present inquiry was undertaken with a view of settling, if possible, one or two doubtful points in our knowledge of the vascular system of Fishes, and of giving, in an accessible form, a fairly complete account of the blood-vessels of a typical Selachian, since, as far as I am aware, this has not yet been done. The arteries and veins of the Skate are figured, for the most part very accurately, by Monro (16); the arteries of Raja and Torpedo are described and figured in detail by Hyrtl (11), and there are good general accounts of the vascular system in both orders of Plagiostomi in the works of Müller (17), Stannius (25), and Milne Edwards (14). By all these authors, however, several points of considerable importance are either missed or but slightly referred to, while others are more or less inaccurately described. In all the more modern text-books of comparative anatomy to which I have had access the vascular system of Fishes is very meagrely treated, the manuals of Owen (19), Huxley (10), Claus (4), Gegenbaur (7), Rolleston (24), Macalister (13), Günther (8), and Wiedersheim (26), adding little or nothing to the excellent though brief account in Stannius’s handbook just referred to. Indeed, the only general work I have seen which gives any important information not to be found in Stannius is Milne Edwards’s ‘Leçons,' in which the description of the vascular system, and especially of the arteries of Fishes, is full, and, like everything else in that invaluable book, admirably clear.