SMALL-NAILED SEAL. 181 



visiting London, found, in the Museum of th- 

 Royal College of Surgeons, among other crania of 

 Seals, one without a label, which differed from any 

 he had previously examined, and which, therefore, 

 he could not satisfactorily refer to any known spe- 

 cies. When thus perplexed, he met with another 

 cranium at Havre, or rather it was a stuffed Seal, 

 retaining the skull, and forming a part of the Col- 

 lection of M. Hauville of that town, in which the 

 same peculiarities existed. M. Hauville's prepara- 

 tion was a very beautiful one, between seven and 

 eight feet long ; the body was elongated, the form 

 of the head, eyes, and nostrils, was not unlike that 

 of the Monk Seal, to be afterwards described ; the 

 mystachial bristles were short, simple, and smooth ; 

 no external ears were to be found, not even an orifice ; 

 the anterior paws were falciform, the toes decreasing 

 in size from the first to the last, the nails very small, 

 that on the thumb not being terminal ; the external 

 toes of the hind flippers were the largest ; and all 

 of them had nails, which, however, were extremely 

 small, hence its name Leptonyx ; the tail was short. 

 This specimen was believed to have been brought 

 from the Southern Ocean.* 



In the year 1822, the late Sir E. Home published 

 an accurate engraving and account of the cranium 

 which had attracted M. de B.'s attention, thus con- 

 firming the accuracy of his report, and supplying 

 the additional information, that the Seal from which 



* Journ. de Physique, t. xci. p. 297. 



