MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 61 



the Berlin Museum mentioned by Peters, and the skull in the British 

 Museum figured and described by Gray. 



With the Monterey skull above mentioned, Dr. Gray received another 

 very young skull, and the skin of a fur seal, both of which were said 

 to have belonged to one animal, and which he hesitatingly referred 

 to his Arctocephalus monteriensis.* Later, however, he regarded them 

 as representing a new species,! which he called Arctocephalus califor- 

 nianus. Still later he again seems to refer them to his Eumetopias 

 Stelleri \ (=. Arctocephalus monteriensis Gray, of earlier date). Con- 

 cerning this skin he remarked at one time as follows: "If the skin 

 sent last year by Mr. Taylor to Mr. Gurney, and by that gentleman 

 presented to the Museum, is the young of this species \_A. monteriensis'], 

 the young animal is blackish, silvered by the short white tips to the 

 short black hairs ; those on the nape and hinder parts of the body with 

 longer white tips, making those parts whiter and more silvery. The 

 under-fur is very abundant, reaching nearly to the end of the hair. 

 The end of the nose and sides of the face are whitish. The whiskers 

 are elongated, rigid, smooth, and white. The hind feet are elongate, 

 with rather long flaps to the toes. The skull is small for the size of 

 the skin, and I should have doubted its belonging to the skin if it were 

 not accompanied by the following label : ' Skull of the fur seal I sent 

 last year. It is very imperfect, from my forgetting where I had put it; 

 but it must do until accident throws another in the way; the other 

 bones were lo~t. — A. S. T.' " § 



As Dr. Gray seems to have finally become settled in his opinion 

 that this skin is identical with his A. monteriensis, afterwards called by 

 him Eumetopias Stelleri, this may account for the statement (already 

 referred to in my " Resume,") recently made by him || and subse- 

 quently reiterated,^" that the Eumetopias Stelleri is a species in which 

 " the fur is very dense, standing nearly erect from the skin, forming a 

 very soft, elastic coat, as in 0. falklandica and 0. Stelleri, which," he 

 erroneously says, "are the only seals that have a close, soft, elastic 

 fur." From his description of this young skull it is apparently reler- 



* Proc. Loud. Zool. Soc, 1S59, p. 358. 



t Cat. Seals and Whales, 1866. p. 49. 



J Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 3d Series, 1866, Vol. XVilI, p. 233. 



§ Proc. Lond. Zool. Soc, 1859, p. 358. 



I! Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 4th Series, 1866, Vol. I, p. 101. 



1 Ibid., p. 215. 



