130 Dr. J. E. Gray on the Species of Manatees, : 



XV. — On the Species of Manatees (Manatus), and on the Diffi- 

 culty of distinguishing such Species by Osteological Characters. 

 By Dr. J. E. Gray, F.R.S. 



The species of Manatees [Manatus) appear to be in great con- 

 fusion. The American and African animals have each had no 

 less than five specific names. I believe this has chiefly arisen 

 from skulls of different ages having been examined, and espe- 

 cially from the fewness of the specimens contained in mu- 

 seums compared with those now to be seen in Loudon. The 

 British Museum has specimens of the American and of the 

 African kind, and there is a skeleton from each country aud 

 several skulls in the Museum of the College of Surgeons. 



I will first give the history of the skulls which have been 

 figured by preceding authors, on which the species have been 

 founded, and then the result of the examination of the specimens 

 in the British Museum and in the Museum of the College of 

 Surgeons. 



In the Paris Museum there is a skeleton of the American 

 Manatee which M. Geoffroy carried off from the Museum of 

 Aguda during the occupation of Portugal by the French (see 

 Blainv. Osteog., Manatus, p. 135). The special habitat of this 

 specimen is not known; but it is most probably from the 

 Brazils, that being a Portuguese possession. It is rather more 

 than 6 feet long. This skeleton formed the material of Cuvier's 

 description and figure of the American Manatee in the ' Osse- 

 mens Fossiles' (v. t. 19. f. 1, 2, 3)*, and of the figures of the 

 skeleton, skull, and teeth of that animal in Blainville's ' Osteo- 

 graphie ' (Gravigrades), Manatus, 1. 1, 3, 5. 



The front of the skull of Cuvier's figure of this specimen is 

 copied by Dr. Harlan, t. 13. f. 5 ; and the skeleton and skull 

 are copied into F. Cuvier's ' Hist. Nat. Cetaces,' 1. 2. f. 1, 2, and 

 t. 3 (1836). 



De Blainville's figure of the skull, separate from the skeleton, 

 is much narrower and longer than Cuvier's figure of the same 

 specimen in the Paris Museum, and far longer than any skull I 

 have seen. Cuvier's figure is not a bad representation of our 

 skull from America. 



Cuvier (Oss. Foss. v. 243) describes a young specimen, sent 

 from Cayenne, rather more than 3 feet long. 



In the 'Philosophical Transactions' for 1821 Sir Everard 

 Home described and figured the animal and skeleton of the 

 Manatee of the West Indies, sent by the Duke of Manchester 

 from Jamaica (the skeleton is in the Museum of the College of 

 Surgeons), to show the differences between it and the skeleton 



* By mistake, at p. 255 the references to the figures are reversed. 



