374 THE PORPOISE 



make a breathing hole. A third suggestion is due to Scores! )y, 

 who was led to make it from having taken out of the stomach of 

 a Narwhal a large skate. He held that with its tusk tlie Whale 

 empaled the iish and then swallowed it. The JSTarwhal is not 

 large, 15 feet or so in length. lUit Lacepede, who was apt to 

 compile with lack of discrimination, speaks of 60 feet long 

 Narwhals. Monodon is purely Arctic, and ])ut three or four 

 specimens have ever Ijeen cast up on our shores. 



Of true I'orpoises, genus Fhocaena, tliere are apparently 

 several species. The genus itself has the following characters : — 

 The teeth are sixteen to twenty-six on each half of each jaw ; 

 their crowns are compressed and lobed. The pterygoids do not 

 meet. The dorsal tin has a row of tubercles along its margin. 



The Porpoise of our coasts, F. communis, is a smallish species 

 6 to 8 feet in length. There are two to four hairs present in 

 the young ; its colour is black, generally lighter on tlie belly. 

 The first six cervical vertebrae are fused. The ribs vary in 

 number from twelve to fourteen pairs. It is a gregarious Whale, 

 and will ascend rivers ; it has been seen for example in the 

 Seine at Paris. Tlie name Porpoise is often written Porkpisce, 

 which of course shows its origin. Very conveniently it was 

 regarded as a fisli, and therefore allowed to be eaten in Lent. 

 The celebrated Dr. Caius, a gourmet as well as a physician and 

 the refounder of a college, invented a particular sauce wherewith 

 to dress this royal dish. Some time since Dr. Gray described a 

 l*orpoise from Margate as a distinct species (see p. 342) on account 

 of the tubercles, which are now known to be a generic character. 



Dr. Burmeister's P. sjnnij^ennis seems, however, to be really 

 distinct. It was captured near the mouth of the Piio de la Plata. 

 It is more tuberculated on the tin and back, and has fewer teeth 

 (sixteen as against twenty-six). 



Mr. True's P. dallii of the Pacific (where the Common 

 Porpoise also occurs) is characterised chiefly by its very long 

 vertebral column, consisting of ninety-eight vertebrae ; there 

 are only sixty-eight in the other species. The Eastern genus 

 Neomeris is placed with Phocacna by Dr. Blanford. It practi- 

 cally only differs by the absence of a dorsal fin. It is only 

 about 4 feet long, and inhabits the seas of India, Cape of Good 

 Hojie, and Japan. The one species is called JV. jyhocaenoides. 



The genus Glohicephalus is to be defined thus : — Teeth 



