REPOKT ON NATIONAL MUSEUM. 209 



new to science. The specimens of Ziphioid and Physeterine whales 

 are especially worthy of attention. 



In April a specimen of an apparently new species of Kogia, which 

 has been provisionally called K. Goodei, was received from the life-saving 

 station at Spring Lake, New Jersey. In October the curator assisted 

 in making a cast and secGring the skeleton of a specimen of Ziphius 

 car irostr is, stranded near the life-saving station at Barnegat City, N.J. 

 Both these specimens are the first of their kind reported from the north- 

 western Atlantic. Among the specimens collected by Dr. Leonhard 

 Stejneger in Bering Island are the skulls of two ziphioid whales, which 

 have been described by that gentleman under the names of Berardius 

 Bairdii and Ziphius GrebniteJcii, and are, so far as I am aware, the 

 first ziphioid s from the northern Pacific. In August a large number of 

 sperm-whale bones was received from Cape Canaveral, Florida, where a 

 small school of individuals of different ages stranded in the fall of 1882. 

 Mr. Almout Barnes, United States consul in Venezuela, transmitted 

 from Messrs. Fairup and Gorsira, a collection of bones of killer whales, 

 Orca sp., from the Aves Islands. It will be an interesting task to clear 

 up the history of these remains, which are represented as occurring in 

 great quantities on the islands referred to. In July the skeleton and fine 

 set of whalebone of a Lesser Rorqual, Balcenoptera rostrata, stranded at 

 Monomoy Point, Cape Cod, were received from Mr. William Bloomer. 



Other interesting cetaceans, including specimens of Phoccena commu- 

 nis, Phoccena lineata, Delpliitms delphis, and a dolphin, apparently new, 

 and which was provisionally named Tursiops subridens,* were received 

 aud are recorded in the list of accessions. 



Some important sirenians have also been received. The Linnean 

 Society of New South Wales, through Dr. Macleay, presented a speci- 

 men of the Dugong of Australian waters, Halicore dugong, a species 

 which was wanting in the collections. By exchange with the British 

 Museum the Institution obtained a skin and skeleton of the African 

 manatee, Triclieclius senegalensis. These, with the specimens of Ameri- 

 can manatees received during the last and previous years, complete the 

 collection of sirenians, which now includes every existing species. 



The Museum is indebted mainly to Dr. C. Hart Merriam and Dr. Phil- 

 lipe Poey, of Havana, for the majority of the important additions to the 

 collections of seals received in 1883. Through Dr. Poey's disinterested 

 action the Institution was enabled to purchase for the Museum a mounted 

 skin and skull of the rare West India seal, Monachus tropicalis, which, 

 with the exception of a skin now or until recently existing in the British 

 Museum, is the only specimen in any scientific collection in the world. 



The seals obtained by Dr. Merriam during his expedition to Labrador, 

 although not rare species, are very important, in that they exhibit the 

 changes incident upon growth and the differences of males and females 

 of the same species. The species included in the collection are Phoca 



* This species is now known to be synonymous with T. tursio. — F. W. T. 

 II. Mis. 09 U 



