GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 751 



southern species on the whole appearing to be somewhat the 

 larger of the two. 



In respect to color, Eaton says of the Sea Elephant of Ker- 

 guelen Island : "Some examples are uniformly reddish brown; 

 others are pale, blotched and spotted with darker grey ".* 

 Peters describes an old example from the same locality as dark 

 brown, the hairs being white at the base, and brown or blackish- 

 brown at the tips. Pe>on gives the color as sometimes grayish, 

 sometimes bluish-gray, more rarely brownish -black. Lizarst 

 has described the color of a female as dark olive brown, shad- 

 ing to a yellowish -bay upon the belly. Scammon gives the color 

 of California examples as light brown, but adds that the new 

 coat has a bluish cast. It thus appears that the two specie* 

 present a striking similarity of coloration. 



I have before me two skulls of the northern species, both of 

 which are those of adult females, and also four skulls of the 

 southern species, but of these two are those of adult males, 

 and the others those of animals probably less than three months 

 old. Of the two young skulls, one is from Kerguelen Island 

 (Kidder), and the other from the "Cape of Good Hope" (Lay- 

 ard). The adult skulls being of different sexes are not com- 

 parable. They differ greatly in size (see measurements, anted,, 

 p. 748), and necessarily in other features, but to what extent 

 these differences are merely sexual cannot be stated. 



From the foregoing it would seem that the northern and 

 southern Sea Elephants, though presumably distinct, are closely 

 allied, as well in structural characters as in habits. In respect 

 to geographical distribution, I am not aware that the south- 

 ern species has been found north of about the 35th degree of 

 south latitude (the island of Juan Fernandez), or the northern 

 species south of about the 24th degree of north latitude. It 

 may consequently be safely assumed that the two forms have 

 been long isolated, and that the southern is an offshoot from 

 northern stock, since the only other known species of the 

 Cystophorince is also northern. 



GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. The Sea Elephant seems 

 to have been formerly very abundant on the coast of Califor- 

 nia and Western Mexico, whence it became long since nearly 



*Proc. Roy. Soc. London, vol. xxiii, 1875, p. 502. See also Pkilosoph. 

 Transact., vol. clxviii, 1879, p. 96. 



t Hamilton's Marine Amphibia, p. 211. 



