NOTE ON KOGIA BREVICEPS. 303 
A NOTE ON KOGIA BREVICEPS. 
By JosEPH PEARSON. 
(With four Plates.) 
SPECIMEN of Kogia breviceps (de Blainville), the Pygmy 
Sperm Whale, was washed ashore at Moratuwa on 
the western coast of Ceylon on November 30, 1915, and the 
carcase was presented to the Colombo Museum by Mr. J. B. 
N. Jayasinhe. The specimen was stuffed, but the skin dete- 
riorated very rapidly owing to the difficulty of removing the 
fat and oil. Finally, it was decided to make a papier-maché 
cast, and this has proved a complete success, and is now 
exhibited in the Mammalian Gallery of the Colombo Museum, 
together with a complete skeleton. Although the skull and 
other parts of the skeleton are fairly well known, I do not 
know of any other Museum in which there is a cast of the 
soft parts. 
The synonymy of Kogia breviceps is somewhat complicated, 
and it has been described under the following names :— 
Physeter breviceps de Blainville, 1838; Hwphysetes grayit Wall, 
1851; Huphysetes simus Owen, 1869; Huphysetes macleayii 
Krefit, 1865; Kogia flowert Gill, 1871; Huphysetes pottsii 
Haast, 1874; Cogia breviceps Benham, 1901. Also Kogia 
breviceps, K. grayit, K. simus, K. macleayii, and K. potisi: by 
various authors. 
It is now generally agreed that there is only one species, 
though there appears to be a good deal of variation within 
the species regarding the proportions of the cranial bones, 
the absence or presence of teeth on the upper jaw, the number 
of ribs, the vertebral formula, and the phalangeal formula. 
