190 DR W. B. DRUMMOND ON 
the upper jaw, of about 300 plates or lamine, which stand 
close together transversely to the long axis of the mouth. 
Within the main row there are some subsidiary rows. The 
extremities and inner margins of the plates are fringed with 
stiff bristles which clothe the whole gigantic palate, and serve 
to strain or sift the water, and thus secure the minute prey 
on which these great animals subsist. The middle and 
longest lamina in the Greenland whale is 10, 12, or even 15 
feet in length; but in the different species of cetaceans 
there are gradations in length; the middle lamina being in 
one species, according te Scorsby, 4 feet, in another 3, in 
another 18 inches, and in the Balenoptera rostrata only 
about 9 inches in length.” The whales are probably de- 
rived from the same primitive stock as the Ungulata; and 
you will observe that they differ from them, not only in 
their very perfect adaptation to a marine life, but also in 
the nature of their food, for, like the overwhelming majority 
of marine animals, they are carnivorous in their habits. 
Another point of importance, common among pelagic animals, 
is that many of the species have a very wide distribution. 
Examples of both groups are found in practically every sea. 
Seals.—The seals and walruses form another group of 
animals which have become adapted to an aquatic life, but 
which are, nevertheless, closely related to the true Carnivora, 
of which they form a sub-order, They are purely car- 
nivorous in their habits, and subsist on fishes, crustacea, and 
mollusea, of which they consume enormous numbers. 
Birds.—One is tempted to mention a few birds, such as 
the penguin, as entitled to a place amongst the pelagic 
fauna. 
Fishes.—The great majority of marine fishes, including 
those most familiar to us, must be considered as shore- 
frequenting. Many of the genera are almost world-wide in 
their distribution. Most of the genera, for example, which 
frequent British seas are represented on both coasts of 
America, in the Mediterranean, and in the Japanese district. 
Truly pelagic fishes which pass their lives on the free 
expanse of the ocean are less numerous. Among them are 
many bony fishes, such as mackerels, flying-fish, sunfish ; but 
the cartilaginous fishes bulk largely here, and include some 
