The Scottish Naturalist. 147 



P. tursio, Sibbald's old Orkney whale with the worn teeth. 

 This somewhat unfortunate arrangement must have placed in- 

 numerable difficulties in the way of Zoologists, who — as was 

 long the custom — always attempted to identify the Cetaceans 

 they met with, with one or other of those described in the 

 Linnean system. Indeed it is not perhaps too much to say, that 

 no satisfactory evidence exists to prove that any specimen of 

 P. microps, or P. tursio, have been met with since the days of 

 Sibbald. And as Artead describes P. macrocephalus, "Ph. 

 dor so impenni, fistula in cervice" it need scarcely be stated that 

 no Sperm whale has yet turned up, nor is, from the co-relation of 

 parts, ever likely to do, with the blow-hole in the neck. This 

 mistake, however, Clusius seems to be at least as much respon- 

 sible for as Sibbald. Bayer* figures a whale stranded at Nice 

 in 1736, which Dr. Gray believes to be a representation of 

 P. tursio. Cuvier,t on the other hand considered it only a bad 

 figure of a Cachalot. Dr. Gray has still sufficient confidence 

 in Sibbald to retain P. tursio, as a species, in his excellent Cata- 

 logue of Seals and Whales. Amongst other British Naturalists, 

 Pennant, 1 Shaw, 2 Jenyns,3 Bell, 4 and others, called P. tursio 

 the High-finned Cachalot. Fleming adopted all the Linnean 

 whales of this kind, and calls P. microps the Spermaceti whale. 

 None of these authors thought it necessary to increase the 

 number of species of Sperm whales. On the continent, 

 they were increased at a rather rapid rate. Bonnaterre,5 

 following Linnaeus, increased the number of species to six, 

 Lacepe'de,^ came after, and made eight of them, Desmarest 

 made another addition, and so on, until Cuvier>" took up the 

 matter, and after a critical examination of all the evidence re- 

 lating to the subject he could obtain, he stated that there was 

 only one species of Cachalot, and in this, of course, he included 

 the large Sperm whales of Sibbald, whom he blames for having 

 described the Cachalot twice. Eschricht 8 likewise states that 

 Sibbald's Limekilns, and Orkney whale "with the high dorsal 

 fin," were nothing else than a young and an old specimen of the 

 common Cachalot ; and that the best evidence of their being 



*Act. Nat. Cur. , 1733. + Hist. Nat. des Cdtaces. 



1 Brit. Zoology. 2 General Zoology. 3 Brit. Vert. Animals. 4 Brit. Quadru- 

 peds. 5 Cetaces. 6 Cetaces. 7 Oss. Fossiles. 8 Orca, Ray Soc. 



