272 Zoological Proceedings of Societies. 



The first discovery Sir Everard had to state was, that the hind 

 flipper or foot of the Walrus is provided with means for enabling 

 the animal to walk in opposition to gravity precisely analagous to 

 those possessed by the Fly, and the use of which could not have 

 been suspected, had not the previous discovery been made re* 

 specting the latter animal, as described in the Phil. Trans, for 

 1816. Sir Everard at once recognized this structure on seeing a 

 mutilated foot of the Walrus, and, in consequence, had requested 

 his friend Capt. Sabine to procure him a specimen of the animal, 

 which Capt. S. had accordingly done, with the aid of the 

 assistant-surgeon of the vessel in which he sailed. The examina- 

 tion of this specimen showed, that in the hind foot of the Walrus 

 there is a cup for enabling the animal to produce a vacuum, and 

 thus to walk in opposition to gravity exactly like the two cups 

 with which the Fly's foot is provided. The apparatus in the 

 latter required magnifying 100 times to make the cups distinctly 

 visible, but in the Walrus it was diminished four times to bring 

 it within the compass of a quarto plate. The author, when 

 writing his former papers on the Fly's means of progression, had 

 not been able to determine the use of the two points in the foot 

 of that animal ; Mr. Adams had called them pickers, aud had 

 supposed that they were inserted in the cavities of the surface 

 over which the animal was walking, and thus retained it in oppor 

 sition to gravity, — an opinion which Sir Everard Home deemed 

 undeserving of consideration ; though he could not assign any use 

 to the points in question. In the foot of the Walrus, however, 

 it is evident that the two toes which answer to the points in that 

 of the Fly are used for the purpose of bringing the web closely 

 down upon the surface traversed, so as to enable the animal to 

 form a more perfect vacuum, and that the air is reradmitted on 

 their being lifted up. This part of the paper was illustrated by a 

 drawing by Mr. Bauer ; and it was singular, Sir Everard ob- 

 serves, that that gentleman should have had to delineate the same 

 organ in two such different animals. 



The second fact described in this paper also relates to the 

 Walrus. The bile in this animal is received from the liver by a 

 lateral communication into a large cylindrical reservoir, with much 



