210 MAMMALIA. 



MoNODON, Lin. 



The Narwhals have no teeth properly speaking, but mere long, 

 straight and pointed tusks, implanted in the intermaxillary bone, 

 and directed in the line of the axis of the body. The form of their 

 body and that of their head greatly resemble that of the Porpoises. 

 One species only is well known, the 



M. monoceros^ L.; Scoresby, Arct. Reg. pi. xv.(l) The Nar- 

 whal.) The tusk of this animal, which is spirally furrowed and 

 sometimes ten feet in length, was for a long time called the 

 horn of the Unicorn. It has, it is true, the germs of two tusks, 

 but it is very seldom that both become equally developed. That 

 of the left side usually attains its full growth, while the -other 

 always remains hidden in its alveolus.(2) According to the 

 description of the Narwhal, it is hardly more than twice or 

 thrice the length of its tusk^ the skin is marbled with brown 

 and a kind of white; the muzzle is arched; mouth small; spira- 

 cle on top of the head, and no dorsal fin, but merely a salient 

 crest along the spine. The tusks are sometimes found perfectly 

 smooth. (3) 



The other Cetacea have the head so large as to constitute 

 one third or one half of the length of the whole body ; but 

 neither the cranium nor the brain participate in this dispro- 



belongs to the Grampus, is the same as the Two-toothed Dolphin of Hunter ; Baus- 

 sard expressly mentions its two teeth. It is also the Balaena rostrata of Klein and 

 of Chemnitz, Besch. der Berl. g-es. IV, p. 183; of Pennant, Brit. Zool. No. V; of 

 Pontoppidan, Ncr. II, 120; the Bottle-head of Dale, &c. Chemnitz found one of 

 the teeth. See Oss. Foss. torn. V, p. 1, f. 324. 



(1) The Narval microcephak, Lacep. pi. v, f. 2, is nothing more than a common 

 Narwhal, not quite so badly figured as in pi. iv, f. 3, which is copied from a bad 

 drawing of Klein, Pise, per Pulm. Resp. pi. ii, fig. c, from ar. individual captured 

 in the Elbe in 1736, afterwards stuffed and exhibited in Dresden. Anderson gives 

 a rather better figure of the same individual. Fr. Tr. II, p. 108. 



(2) We have found this small tusk in several crania, and verified the statements 

 of Anderson on this subject. It is prevented from being developed by its internal 

 cavity becoming too rapidly filled with the matter of the ivory, which thus obliter- 

 ates its gelatinous coi'e . 



(3) The Monodon spurius of Fabricius, or Anarkak of Greenland, (Jncylodon, 

 Illig.) which has but two small curved teeth in the upper jaw and a dorsal fin, 

 cannot be far removed from the Hyperoodon. J^ul, ivale, in all the languages de- 

 rived from the Teutonic, signifies Whale, and is often employed for the Cetacea in 

 general; nur, in the language of the Icelanders, means cadaver, or dead body, 

 and it is pretended that such is the food of this genus. 



