4o6 General Notes. [May, 



the animals living within its limits. It is also a region in which the 

 temperature is very low, where it varies but little from the freezing 

 point, and where the conditions under which the animals now living 

 there have probably remained undisturbed for a considerable 

 period of time, geologically speaking. It is in this abyssal region 

 that we find the greatest number of forms having an ancient 

 facies. In the continental belt they are less numerous, and their 

 resemblance is more with the types of the later geological 

 periods." 



Steller's Manatee. — In his "Voyage of theFr^^," Baron Nor- 

 denskjold has collected all information attainable on Steller's sea- 

 cow (Rhytina StelleriJ, which on Steller's visit to Bering island 

 in 1 74 1, was found pasturing in large herds on the abundant sea- 

 weeds on the shores of the island. Twenty-seven years after, not 

 a specimen was to be found, and it was believed to be then ex- 

 tinct. But Baron Nordenskjold adduces evidence to prove that a 

 specimen was seen twenty-seven years ago, though there can be 

 little doubt that it has really gone the way of the mammoth. The 

 Baron does not believe that its extinction is due to the destruc- 

 tion by hunters, but that it was a survival from a past age doomed 

 to extinction, which oveitook it when driven from its pastures on 

 the shores of Bering island. 



Steller's sea-cow (Rhytina Stclleri Cuvier) in a way took the 

 place of the cloven-footed animals among the marine mammalia. 

 The sea-cow was of a dark-brown color, sometime varied with 

 white spots or streaks. The thick leathery skin was covered with 

 hair which grew together so as to form an exterior skin, which 

 was full of vermin and resembled the bark of an old oak. The 

 full-grown animal was from twenty-five to thirty- eight English 

 feet in length and weighed about sixty-seven cwt. The head was 

 small in proportion to the large thick body, the neck short, the 

 body diminishing rapidly behind. The short foreleg terminated 

 abruptly without fingers or nails, but was overgrown with a num- 

 ber of short thickly placed brush-hairs; the hind-leg was replaced 

 by a tail-fin resembling a whale's. The animals wanted teeth, but 

 was instead provided with two masticating plates, one in the gum, 

 the other in the under jaw. The udders of the female, which 

 abounded in milk, were placed between the fore-limbs. The flesh 

 and milk resembled those of liorned cattle, indeed in Steller's 

 opinion surpassed them. The sea-cows were almost constantly 

 employed in pasturing on the sea-weed which grew luxuriantly 

 on the coast, moving the head and neck while so doing much in 

 the same way as an ox. While they pastured they showed great 

 voracity, and did not allow themselves to be disturbed in the least 

 by the presence of man. One might even touch them without 

 their being frightened or disturbed. They entertained great 

 attachment to each other, and when one was harpooned the others 

 made incredible attempts to rescue it. 



