Humpbacked Whale. 21 
Weymouth in 1871; but this specimen had to be destroyed, with 
the exception of the flukes, the back-fin, and one of the flippers, 
which are shown on the east wall of the building. The Museum 
possesses the skeleton of an immature Rorqual from Borneo which 
cannot be distinguished from this species; and specimens from 
Argentina indicate its occurrence in South American waters. 
Humpbacked Megaptera bodps, or M. nodosa, the single well- 
Whale, defined representative of its genus, is a large ny hale 
(fig. 5) nearly allied to the Rorquals, from which it 
is at once distinguished by the inordinate length of the flippers, 
which have their margins indented, or scalloped, and are generally 
of a pure glistening white, thus forming a marked contrast to the 
black of the upper-parts of the head and body. In length the 
flippers are nearly equal to one-fourth that of the entire head and 
body. The chin and throat are grooved, forming a dilatable 
pouch, as in the Rorquals; the back-fin is low, and the whole 
shape relatively short and thick. The usual length attained by 
this species ranges between 45 and 50 feet; the female being 
superior in size to the male. A peculiarity of the blade-bone, or 
scapula (of which a detached pair is exhibited on the north wall), 
is the absence or aborted condition of the acromion and coracoid 
processes. The whalebone is comparatively short, and deep 
black in colour. 
Humpbacks are widely distributed over the Atlantic and 
Pacific Oceans, and are also met with in the Indian Ocean, 
althoagh they rarely visit the British seas. They are remarkable 
for their sportive habits, frequently throwing themselves out 
of the water, and sometimes lying on one side just below the 
surface, with one long white flipper standing vertically out of the 
water. 
In addition to the two specimens of the scapula, the species is 
represented by a miniature model of the entire animal (fig. 5), pre- 
sented by the American Museum of Natural History in 1908, and 
exhibited in a case at the north-west corner of the room. Near 
by, in a jar of spirit, is displayed a portion of one of the flippers, 
the skin of which has attached to it a large cluster of Whale- 
Barnacles (Coronula diadema). This interesting specimen came 
from Japan, and was presented by Mr. G. F. Ringer. On the 
head of the model may be seen a number of rough excrescences, 
which appear to be characteristic of the species. 
