120 MAMMALIA. 



Pelagus, Fred. Cuv. 



Four incisors also, above and below, but their grinders are ob- 

 tuse cones, with a slightly marked heel before and behind. There 

 is one of them in the Mediterranean. 



Ph. monachus, Gm.j Buff. Supp. VI, pi. xiii.(l) (The Monk.) 

 From ten to twelve feet in length, of a blackish brown, with a 

 while belly. It is particularly found among the Grecian and 

 Adriatic Islands, and is, most probably, the species best known 

 to the ancients. 



Stemmatopus, Fred. Cuv. 



Four superior incisors, and two inferior j grinders compressed, 

 slightly trilobate, supported by thick roots. Such is the 



Ph. cristaia, Gm.j Phoca leonina, Fabr.j Eged. Groenl. pi. 

 vi ; jDekay, New York Lye. I, pi. vii. (The Hooded Seal.) 

 Seven or eight feet longj a piece of loose skin on the head, 

 which can be inflated at the pleasure of the animal, and is 

 drawn over the eyes when it is menaced, at which times the 

 nostrils also are inflated like bladders. From the arctic 

 ocean. (2) 

 Finally, the Macrorhinus, Fr. Cuv., has the incisors of the pre- 

 ceding, obtuse conical molars, and the muzzle resembling a short 

 movable proboscis or snout. The largest seal known is of this 

 subgenus ; the 



Ph. leonina, L.; Sea- Lion oi Anson; Sea-Wolf of Pernetty, 

 &c. Peron's Voy. I, xxxii. (The Elephant Seal.) From twenty 

 to twenty-five feet in length j brown, the muzzle of the male 

 terminated by a wrinkled snout, which becomes inflated when 

 the animal is angry. It is common in the southern latitudes of 

 the Pacific Ocean, at the Terra-del-Fuego, New Zealand, Chili, 

 &c. It constitutes an important object of the fisheries, on ac- 

 count of the oil in which it abounds. The 



Otaries, Peron. Seals with external ears 



Are worthy of being formed into a separate genus; because, inde- 

 pendently of the projecting external ears, the four superior middle 

 incisors have a double cutting edge, a circumstance hitherto un- 



ci) It is the same individual described by Hermann, Soc. des Nat. de BerL 

 IV, xii, xiii, under the name oi monarchus . 



(2) The mechanism by which this inflation is effected is not yet well under- 

 stood. See Dekay and Ludlow, Annals of the New York Lyceum, Vol. I, pp. 94 

 and 99. 



