HABITS, PRODUCTS, AND THE CHASE. 619 



Another name of considerable prominence in connection with 

 this species is annellata of Mlsson, proposed by him in 1820 for 

 Scandinavian representatives of the species, because he did 

 not feel sure of their identity with Greenland examples. This 

 name was adopted later by various writers for a species sup- 

 posed to be distinct from the Phoca fcetida of Greenland, notably 

 among whom are Wagner and Eadde, while Giebel held both 

 fcetida and hispida as synonyms of annellatal 



The name disco lor, introduced in 1824 by F. Cuvier as that of 

 a new species, was later abandoned by its author, and never ob- 

 tained currency except with a few compilers. Lesson, in 1828, 

 characteristically changed it to frederici, and at the same time 

 renamed Schreber's hispida, calling it schreberi. 



HABITS, PRODUCTS, AND HUNTING. The Kinged Seal is 

 preeminently boreal, its home being almost exclusively the icy 

 seas of the Arctic Regions. Its favorite resorts are said to be 

 retired bays and fjords, in which it remains so long as they are 

 filled with firm ice ; when this breaks up they betake them- 

 selves to the floes, where they bring forth their young. It is 

 essentially a littoral, or rather glacial species, being seldom 

 met with in the open sea. From its abundance in its chosen 

 haunts it is a species well known to Arctic voyagers, and fre- 

 quent reference is made to it in most of the narratives of 

 Arctic Explorations. These notices are, however, mostly inci- 

 dental and fragmentary, no one having given a detailed and 

 connected history of the species. I am, therefore, gratified to 

 be able to present, in addition to excerpts from various more 

 or less well-known sources, much fresh information kindly fur- 

 fjords and rarely goes out to sea. Ill my Fauna Gronlandica I called it Phoca 

 fceiida because it lias a stronger stink than the other species. It was pre- 

 viously mentioned under this name, first in my report quoted in Mailer's 

 Prodromns (Zool. Dan. Prodr., p. viii). It was then regarded as a new spe- 

 cies, as I found it not- in Liuu6 ; he either did not recognize it or did not dis- 

 tinguish it from the common Seal (Phoca vltnlina), for at most he only re- 

 garded it as a variety of this under the name Gra-Sjiil (Faun. Suec., p. 2, 

 under Spec. 4). But Pennant, however, gave it as a distinct species, with 

 the name Rough Seal (Syn. Quadr., p. 341, u. 2G1); afterwards Schreher 

 called it Der rauhe Seehund (Siiugth. III. Th. p. 312), and Erxlebeu Phoca 

 hispida (Syst. Regn. Anim. p. 589), which name Gmelin (Syst. Nat., p. 64) 

 has retained. This name is suitable and a very good one for this species 

 on account of its hair, and, although this is also found in the Klapmydsen 

 ( Phoca Iconina, Liune"), so are some other characters ; wherefore I do not now 

 hesitate to prefer the name hiiqjida before /tr/irfa, especially as it is the oldest, 

 although the stench is so characteristic." Skrii'ter af Natnrhistorie-Seh- 

 kabat, Iste Bind, 2det Hefte, 1791, pp. 74, 75. 



