THE SCOTTISH NATURALISTIC 



VOLUME THE SIXTH. 



Iqq 



i -*.»-»»- 



L, LIBRAR 



ZOOLOGY. 



> 



^tAS^> 



4/ 



ON THE OCOURKENCE OF THE WHITE -BEAKED DOLPHIN 



(LAGENORHYNCHUS ALBIROSTRIS, GRAY), ON 



THE EAST COAST OF SCOTLAND. 1 



By J. M. CAMPBELL, 

 Joint Secretary of the Natural History Society of Glasgow, &c. 



ALTHOUGH it is to be expected that many of the rarer 

 cetacea frequent our coasts, the as yet imperfect know- 

 ledge of their habits, the difficulty of capture, and the nature of 

 the element in which they live, all militate against the rapid 

 accumulation of facts relating to their occurrence. 



The species which is the subject of this paper, although 

 recorded as British so long ago as 1846, has not yet been added 

 to our list of Scottish fauna. Mr Alston in his paper ' On the 

 Mammalia of Scotland,' read to this Society in April last year, 

 referring to this species says, " The White-beaked Dolphin is 

 another species whose appearance in Scottish waters is to be 

 expected, as it seems frequently to visit the Faroes, and the east 

 coast of England {Cunningham, P. Z. S., 1876, p. 686), but as 

 yet its actual occurrence does not seem to have been recorded." 

 This species was first figured and described by Brightwell in 

 the 'Annals and Magazine of Natural History' (vol. xvii. p. 21), 

 in 1846, under the name of Delphinus tursio, Fabr., from a female 



1 Read to the Natural History Society of Glasgow, November 30, 1880. 

 VOL. VI. A 



