GREENLAND SEAL. 157 



light grey colour, with a black marking on its 

 back, like two half-moons. This marking accurately 

 corresponds with that represented in our plate, 

 which Major C. Hamilton Smith appears to have 

 taken from a specimen in the Museum of Prince 

 Maximilian of Neuveid.* Crantz designates it nei- 

 ther Grcenlandica nor Oceanica, but by the verna- 

 cular name Attersoak. Fabricius, after identifying 

 it with this Attersoak, tells us that his Grcenlandica is 

 six feet long; that its dental formulary is 2 7T6=38; 

 its colour is white on the forehead, with a great 

 moon-shaped marking of a black colour on the 

 sides. The muzzle is said to be very prominent ; 

 and the eyes, ears, tongu, and feet, to be the same 

 as in the P. vitulina. Crantz' account of the successive 

 markings is not very specific, yet as bearing on the 

 difficulties of distinguishing species, we shall subjoin 

 it. He states that, when new born, the Grcenlan- 

 dica is quite white and woolly, f whereas other kinds 

 are smooth and coloured. In the first year it is 

 cream-coloured ; in the second grey ; in the third 

 painted with stripes ; in the fourth spotted ; and in 

 the fifth it wears its half-moons, as the sign of its 

 maturity. Baron Cuvier remarks that he possessed 

 skins both of the adult and young. He states that 

 the fur is drier, and adheres closer to the skin, and 

 is freer of wool at its base than other species ; each 



See Griffiths' Cuvier, t. ii. 506. 



f L epoch in maintains this is a mistake, and applies only to the 

 young of the Hare Seal. Act. Acad. Scient. Russ. Petrop. An. 

 .777. 



