68 



Section I. MYSTICETE. 



Teeth rudimentary ; they never cut the jaics, and are absorbed. Palate 

 furnished with transverse fringed horny plates of baleen or ivhalebone, 

 forming a ^^ screening-up'paraius.'^ Head large, depressed. Blotvers 

 far back, longitudinal, each covered xvith a valve. Spout double. Eyes 

 small, near angle of the mouth. Gullet very contracted. Tympanic 

 bones large, conch-like, attached to an expanded periotic bone, which 

 forms part of tJw skull. Lacrymal and malar bones thin, small. Living 

 on mollusca and fish. 



Balajna, Cuv. Tab. Elem. 1798 ; Lesson, N. Tab. Reg. Anim. 201. 



Ealsenadfe, Gray, Lond. Med. Repos. xv. 310. 



Les Baleines, F. Cuv. 1829. 



Cete, Illiger, Prodr. 141, 1811. 



Cetacea edentula, Brisson, R. A. 218. 



Edentt^s abnormaux, Blainv. 181G. 



Cete hydrajoglossi, § B, Wagler, N. S. Amph. 33, 1830. 



Cetaces, Lesson, N. Tab. Ri-g. Anim. 197, 1842. 



Cetacea, Rafn. Anal. Nat. GO, 1815. 



Riiderer Wale, Oken, Lehrb. Nat. 661, 1815. 



Balenidia, Rafin. Anal. Nat. 61, 1815. 



Bal;T3nid«3, Gray, Ann. Phil. 1828 ; Zool. Erebus Sf Terror, 15 ; Cat. 



Mamm. B. M. ; Cat. Cetac. B. M. 5, 1850 ; Selys-Longchainjis, 1842. 

 Vemiivora, Lesson, N. Tab. Rig. Anim. 201. 

 Bale, Oken, Lehrb. Naturg. 663, 1815. 

 Les Baleines (Baleniens), Geoff. Leqons, 3Iamm. 67, 1835 ; Duvernoy, 



Ann. Sci. Nat. 22, 1851. 

 Bartenwalle, Eschricht, Nord. Wallthiere, 7, 1849. 

 (Baleen Whale) Balsenidae, Owen, Cat. Osteol. 3Ius. Coll. Surg. ii. 439. 

 Balsenidfe, " /. Gray," Bardhwalar, Lilljeborg, Ofversigt, 39, 1862. 

 Balsenoidea sen Mysticete, Flotver, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1864, 388. 



" Teeth never functionally developed, but always disappearing be- 

 fore the close of the intra-uterine life. Upper jaw provided with plates 

 of baleen. Sternum composed of a single piece, generally broader 

 than long, and connected only with the first rib. No costal sternal 

 bones ; all the ribs at their upper extremity articulating only with 

 the transverse processes of the vertebrae ; their capitular processes 

 when developed rudimentary, and not forming true articulations with 

 the bodies of the vertebrae. Eami of the mandibles curved, their 

 anterior ends meeting at an angle and connected by fibrous tissue, 

 without any ti-ue symphysis. Skull symmetrical. Maxilla produced 

 in front of, but not over, the orbital process of the frontal. Nasal 

 bones well developed, symmetrical. Lacrymal bones distinct from 

 the yvigui:'— Flower, P. Z. S. 18G4, 388. 



M. Geoffrey observed rudimentary teeth in the lower jaw of a 

 foetal whale. — Ann. (hi Mus. x. 3G5. Eschricht figures them in the 

 foetal jaw of a Megaptern. — Danish Tranmctions, 1843, xi. t. 3. 



The substance called Whalebone is of the same nature as horn ; it 

 is wholly composed of animal substance, and extremely elastic. — 

 Hunter, Phil. Trans. 1787. It is called /anoH by the French. The 

 Scotch even at the time of Sibbald called it baleen, probably from the 

 French. — Fleming, Wern. Trans. 203. 



The baleen or whalebone has generally been considered as the 



