LAGENORIIYNCHUS ELECTRA. 101 



la the European collections which I examiued I found seven skulls 

 which, in luy estimation, should be accredited to this species. These 

 are as follows: 



British Museum: 



No. 358a. Type of the species. 



No. 358rt. Typo of L. asia Gray. 



No. 1475a. Type of L. fusiformis Owen. 

 Paris Museuui : 



No. o3044. Labeled X. asi'a. 



No. a3082. Labeled L. asia. 

 Cambridge University Museum: 



No. 555a. Labeled L. electra. 

 Royal College of Surgeons of England : 



New No. 3024. Labeled L. electra. 



To these should be added a mandible in the — 



U. S. National Museum: 



No. 4108. Type of Phoccena pecioraJis Peale. 



The differences between the types of L. electra and L. asia are very 

 slight, and are only such as might result from a difference in age. 

 Even Dr. Gray, who was notoriously prone to exaggerate the imi)or- 

 tauce of slight differences, regarded the latter species as possibly a 

 variety of the former.* He pointed out clearly the differences of the 

 two skulls in the following words : 



The skull, which is without teeth, very much resembles, in the depressed and ex- 

 panded form of the brain-cavity and shape of the beak, the skull oi L. electra, hut it 

 differs from that in the beak being rather more acute in front and more contracted in 

 the middle of the sides, and in being rather smaller in size.t 



So far as the width of the beak at the middle is concerned, it will be 

 seen from the measurements that the type of i. asia is intermediate 

 between the type of L. electra and the skull in the Eoyal College of 

 Surgeons, which is also identified with the latter species. 



Furthermore, laying aside the identifications with which the different 

 specimens are ticketed, they can not be divided into two groups accord- 

 ing to the width or the narrowness of the rostrum, but form a continu- 

 ous series, the specimen in the College of Surgeons having the narrow- 

 est rostrum and that at Cambridge the widest. The single distinction 

 given by Gray can not, therefore, have anj' value, and I was unable to 

 discover any other valid characters. 



The principal difference between the skulls of L. fusiformis and L. 

 electra. noted by Professor Owen in his original description of the former 

 species is in the width of the rostrum at the maxillary notch. This 

 character, as I have already stated above, I do not regard as sufifl- 

 ciently pronounced to have any weight. 



The description, and especially the figure of X. fusiformis, becomes 

 interesting, however, in connection with my discovery of the real affin- 

 ity of Peale's Phoccena pectoralis. This species, which has been bandied 



* Gray, Catalogue, 186G, p. 269. t Gray, 1. c. 



