CETACEA. 37 



11. M. Cuvier' s Rorqual de la Me'diterranee is founded on the 

 skull of a whale described by Lacepede (Cetac. t. 5-7) which 

 was stranded near the Isle of Marguerite in 1797. Lacepede 

 gives the following measurements : viz. length, 60 feet ; length to 

 the pectoral, 14 feet 6 inches ; from thence to dorsal, 10 feet 

 9 inches ; and from dorsal to caudal, 8 feet 9 inches : but there 

 must be some mistake, as this makes only 34 feet. The pectoral 

 was 5 feet long, and all black. Cuvier (Oss. Foss. t. 26. f. 5) re- 

 presents the head of this specimen. M. IJ. Cuvier regards this 

 specimen as the type of his E. musculus (Cetac. 334). 



M. F. Cuvier's Cetacea refers to the Mediterranean Rorqual 

 (B. musculus), a, male whale described by M. Companyo, which 

 was cast ashore near St. Cyprien. It was 25,060 metres (82 feet) 

 entire length; the head 5,038 metres (16 feet) ; length of pec- 

 toral 2,010 (13 feet). It had 7 cervical, 14 dorsal, 15 lumbar, 

 and about 25 caudal vertebrae, in all 61. It was dark grey, with 

 the throat and the sides of the pectoral white, the belly blue and 

 white banded, pectoral greyish. Professor Eschricht belives this 

 to be the species I have named Physalus antiquorum. The 

 skeleton was at Lyons in 1835. 



M. Van Beneden found by examining an ear-bone brought 

 from Iceland by M. Quoy, that it belonged to the Rorqual de la 

 Mediterranee of Cuvier (see Ann. Sci. Nat. n. s. vi. 159). 



Albers (Icon. Anat. 1822, t. 1) figures, under the name of 

 Balcena Boops, the skeleton of a whale cast ashore at Vegisack 

 near Bremen, in 1669. The length was 29 feet ; length of pectoral 

 fin 3, width of tail 9. Camper (Cetac. 74. t. 11, 12) figures the 

 skull of this specimen. Cuvier says he compared this skull with 

 the one from St. Marguerite's, figured by Lacepede, and could 

 see no difference between them. Albers's figures would lead to 

 the idea that the lower jaw was scarcely wider than the upper ; 

 this is corrected by Camper. Professor Eschricht considers 

 Albers's specimen the same as Hunter's B. rostrata ; but it agrees 

 with the whales of this genus in having 34 and 35 lumbar and 

 caudal vertebrae. 



12. Balaena rostrata, Rudolphi, Berl. Abhand. 1820, t. 1-4. 

 Rorqual du Nord, Cuvier, Oss. Foss. v. 564. t. 26. f. 6, copied 



from Rudolphi. 



Balaenoptera laticeps, Gray, Zool. Ereb. Terror, 20, from 

 Rudolphi. 



Black, beneath white; upper jaws wide, in the skull only 

 twice as long as the width of their base in front of the orbits, the 

 lower ones slightly curved and scarcely wider than the edge of 



