134 Palmer N'o-nie of Fur Seal. 



might prove to be generically distinct. In this group he placed 

 Phoca jubat(( Gmelin and P. ursina Gmelin. Phoca jubata 

 Gmelin is a composite species based in part on a southern fur 

 seal and in part on the northern sea lion, Leo marinns of Steller 

 = Eumetopias steUeri of recent authors. The name had been, 

 however, previously applied by Forster, in 1775, and is now 

 generally restricted to the southern fur seal. Phoca ursina 

 Gmelin (= P. ursina Linn.), is the northern fur seal of Bering 

 Sea and, as the only identifiable species in the group, may be 

 considered the type of Otoes. 



It may be objected that Fischer did not name the northern 

 fur seal, but merely applied a generic name to the eared seals in 

 general or renamed Otaria of Peron. This, however, was not 

 the case. Peron's Otaria had appeared only the year previous, 

 and there is no evidence that Fischer had ever seen the descrip 

 tion. What he did was simply to apply a generic name to 

 Cuvier's group which, as shown above, was based chiefly on 

 the northern and not on the southern fur seal. 



Three different generic names are now applied to the northern 

 fur seal: Callotaria, Callorhinus and Arctocephalus* . The 

 general adoption of Otoes would obviate this confusion, and the 

 species thus far described would stand Otoes ur sinus (Linnaeus), 

 Otoes alascftntfs (Jordan & Clark), and Otoes curilensis (Jordan 

 & Clark). 



*W. L. Sclater, Mammals of South Africa, I, p. 118, 1900, gives the 

 type of Arctucephalm Cuvier. 1826, as Phoca ursina. 



