152 Mr. W. Thompson on the occurrence of 



ft. in. 



Caudal fin, greatest length 1 11 



fin, greatest breadth 5 6 



fin, greatest thickness 3 



Aperture anterior to vent in length 1 



of vent in length 6 



'^ The marking at each side from behind the lip, extending 

 under the chin in the direction of the belly, is fourteen inches in 

 length ; in breadth it is two inches anteriorly and nine inches 

 posteriorly*. Colour when quite recent of a blackish lead hue, 

 and the skin, which was exquisitely thin, beautifully polished 

 like patent-leather, and more especially so on the tail and caudal 

 fin : it was merely of a lighter shade beneath and not white. No 

 teeth visible.^^ 



Although no teeth could be seen when the animal was en- 

 tire, the removal of the fleshy portion of the lower jaw ex- 

 posed four of them towards its extremity. They are loose in their 

 sockets, and so deeply sunk in the groove as not to be apparent 

 above the bone when the jaw is viewed in profile. Though loose, 

 the two front teeth may be stated as 7^ lines from the extre- 

 mity of the jaw, and the hinder pair as 9 lines distant from them. 

 The accompanying sketch (PI. IV. fig. 1) which I made of them, 

 represents the teeth and jaw of natural size. So much has already 

 been written on the teeth of this species, that I shall content 

 myself with merely calling attention to the very small size of the 

 anterior pair in the present individual — a male upwards of twenty- 

 three feet in length — compared with those represented in Owen^s 

 ^ Odontography,^ pi. 88. fig. 1, although the Hyperoodon to which 

 the latter belonged is said to have been immature, p. 347. The 

 stomach of the Irish specimen was quite empty. It was believed 

 that this animal, which was in the highest condition, would have 

 been about five tons in weight ; it produced above ninety gallons 

 of oil : the entire skeleton has been preserved for the Belfast 

 Museum. 



Baussard^s figure of the Hyperoodon (as repeated in F. Cuvier^s 

 'Hist. Nat. Cetaces/ pi. 17. fig. 1) would with some corrections 

 represent this specimen ; but it has seemed to me desirable to 

 have an outline of it engraved from the drawing already alluded 

 to, zoologically corrected by myself (PL IV. fig. 2). The difier- 

 ence between Baussard^s and the Irish specimen will be seen to 

 consist in the latter being less elongate j in its dorsal fin being 

 smaller, and placed considerably farther back ; in its eye being 

 round instead of oval like the human eye, and in its being defi- 



* These are evidently the same as the *' two diverging furrows " described 

 as " under the throat " in the Physeter hidens of Sowerby ; they were said 

 in the Irish specimen under consideration to have resembled the healed-up 

 deep wounds in the stem of a large tree. 



