36 Guide to Whales, Porportses, and Dolphins, 
its immediate allies, the Porpoise differs from other members 
of the Dolphin family by the peculiar form of its teeth, 
which have spade-shaped instead of sharp and conical crowns 
(fig. 23). The external form is well shown in the American 
specimen and the accompanying illustration (fig. 22). The 
porpoise-hide of commerce is chiefly, if not entirely, White-whale- 
skin; the skin of the porpoise itself being too thin and too oily to 
be of much use. 
Although nearly related to the common species, the In- 
dian Porpoise (Neomeris, or Neophocena, phoceenoides) 
differs by the absence of a back-fin, and the smaller 
number of the teeth, which are also relatively larger. In size it 
is somewhat inferior to the Porpoise, and its colour is almost 
entirely black. The species (fig. 20) is abundant off the coast of 
Bombay and Madras, and has also been met with off Japan, and 
in the Yang-tsi-kiang. The specimens exhibited include a female 
taken in the Yang-tsi-kiang, off Ichang, Central China, at a 
distance of nearly one thousand miles from the sea, and purchased 
in 1888; the skeleton of the same individual being also shown. 
There is also the cast of a smaller individual taken on the coast of 
Travancore, Madras, and presented by the Director of the Museum 
at Trivandrum in 1904. This cast shows very distinctly a 
depressed area in the middle of the back, in which the skin carries 
a number of minute horny scales, supposed to be the remnants of 
a bony and horny armour protecting the extinct Zeuglodonts 
(veferred to at the end of this guide-book). 
Indian 
Porpoise 
_.. ,. Although nearly related to the Porpoise, Heaviside’s 
Heaviside S Dolphin (Cephalorhynchus heavisider), which repre- 
Dolphin. sents a genus by itself, is specially distinguished by 
the greater relative length of the muzzle, this being at least as long 
as the hind portion of the skull. The teeth are of small size, and 
range from 25 to 30 in number on each side of both jaws. The 
back-fin (fig. 24) is low and bluntly triangular or rounded ; while 
the flippers are rather small, narrow, and ovate. A distinctive 
feature of the species is the form of the white markings on the 
under surface, which, as already mentioned, recall those of the 
Killer. This Dolphin, which is smaller than the Porpoise, is an 
inhabitant of the seas of the southern hemisphere. The mounted 
specimen exhibited, which is the type of the species, was presented 
