178 Merriam A New Fur-seal from Guadalupe Island. 



skulls picked up on the beach. One of these, the type, is an 

 adult male which has lost the teeth and lower jaw. Another is 

 a young adult female with both jaws and all the teeth. The 

 remaining two are very imperfect, lacking both the jaws and face. 

 The species seems doomed to speedy extermination, and, so 

 far as known, no museum in the world has a single specimen. 

 It is hoped that our National Museum will be able to secure 

 complete specimens before it is too late. 



Arctocephalus townsendi sp. nov. Guadalnpe Fur-seal. 



Type locality. Guadalupe Island, off Lower California. Type No. 83617, 

 $ ad., U. S. National Museum. Collected on the beach on west side of 

 Guadalupe May 22, 1892, by C. H. Townsend. 



Cranial characters. Contrasted with skulls of Arctocephalus (australis or 

 philllpi) from the Galapagos Islands, skulls of .4. townsendi differ in some 

 what smaller size; much shorter rostrum; shorter nasals; larger and 

 more freely open incisive foramina; heavier and shorter ascending 

 branches of premaxillpe, which do not push backward along the nasals 

 as in auslralis; smaller, flatter, and smoother audital bullae; much nar 

 rower and more deeply excavated palate ; narrower postpalatal notch ; 

 broader and heavier jugals; broader zygomatic processes of maxillse, 

 w r hich are expanded to form a broad floor under the anterior half of the 

 orbit; larger, broader, and more rounded anterior nares in the male, and 

 absence of sagittal crest between frontals. 



The most important characters are the exceedingly narrow and exca 

 vated palate, flat audital bullse, short and thick ascending arm of pre- 

 maxilla, and broadly expanded zygomatic root of maxilla, forming a floor 

 under the anterior half of the orbit. There are also tooth characters : the 

 first upper molar (5th molariform tooth) is mainly posterior to plane of 

 anterior root of zygoma; both upper true molars are double rooted, and 

 the last upper premolar is incompletely double rooted. 



In the female of townsendi the narrow and deeply excavated form of the 

 palate is even more emphasized than in the male, and the postorbital 

 constriction is very inach narrower than in the female of australis. 



Measurements of $ Skull of Arctocephalus townsendi (the type). 



Greatest basal length (gnathion to occipital condyles) 256 



Basal length (gnathion to basion) 243 



Basilar length of Hensel (basion to incisors) 233 



Palatine length (gnathion to postpalatal notch) . 120 



Postpalatal length (postpalatal notch to basion) 125 



Zygomatic breadth 151 



Lateral series of teeth (canine to last molar inclusive) 88 



Distance between canines 22.5 



Distance between 3d pair of molariform teeth 22.5 



Breadth (anteroposterior) of zygomatic root of maxilla between infe 

 rior lip of antorbital foramen and orbit 21 



