192 A BOOK OF WHALES 



is not a difference of importance, as these bones are 

 known to vary in other whales. 



A small species, Kogia pottsi, has been recorded 

 by von Haast* from the shores of New Zealand 

 which only measured 7 feet 2 inches in total length. 

 Its colour was black, with a greyish white belly. 

 The chief reason for distinguishing it from K. grayi 

 is the vertebral formula: C. 7; D. 12; L. 11; Ca. 20. 

 There are thus two pairs of ribs less, and besides this 

 there are only eight chevron bones. 



The genus PHYSETER}- may be thus denned :- 

 Head enormous ; blow hole single, on left side ; 

 dorsal fin represented by a series of low humps. 

 Atlas separate from rest of cervicals, which are fused. 

 Snout long ; jugal joining squamosal. 



"In no mammal," remarks Sir W. Flower,^ "does 

 the cranium depart from the ordinary type to such 



* " On the Occurrence of a new Species of Euphysetes (Euphysetes 

 pottsii\ a remarkably small Catodont Whale, on the coast of New 

 Zealand," Proc. Zool. Soc., 1874, p. 260. 



i Meganeuron is an additional generic name introduced by Dr. Gray 

 for the sake of a set of cervical vertebrae from the Australian seas. 



This seems to have been quite an unnecessary proceeding, for in 

 the first place the creation of a new species, let alone a new genus, upon 

 a set of vertebrae is a highly risky proceeding, especially when those 

 bones might, as I believe in the present case they do, belong to a young 

 animal. They are in fact about half the size of the same bones in 

 a full-grown Cachalot, therefore the different shape of the foramen 

 for the spinal cord may be accounted for by incomplete ossification of 

 the bone. 



J " On the Osteology of the Sperm Whale," Trans. Zool. Soc., vi., 

 P- 3H- 



