CARNARIA. 105 



it is menaced, at which times the nostrils also are inflated like blad- 

 ders. From the arctic ocean*. 

 Finally, the Macrorhinus, Fr. Cuv., has the incisors of the preceding, 

 obtuse conical molars, and the muzzle resembling a short moveable pro- 

 boscis or snout. The largest seal known is of this subgenus ; the 



Ph. leonina, L. ; Sea Lion of Anson; Sea JVolf oi Pernetty, &c. 

 Peron's Voy. I. xxxii. (The Elephant Seal) (a). From twenty to 

 twenty-five feet in length; brown, the muzzle of the male terminated 

 by a wrinkled snout, which becomes inflated when the animal is 

 angry. It is common in the southern latitudes of the Pacific Ocean, 

 at the Terra-del-Fuego, New Zealand, Chili, &c. It constitutes an 

 important object of the fisheries, on account of the oil in which it 

 abounds. The 



Otaries, Peron. Seals ivith external ears 



Are worthy of being formed into a separate genus ; because, independently 

 of the projecting external ears, the four superior middle incisors have a 

 double cutting edge, a circumstance hitherto unknown in any animal ; the 

 external ones are simple and smaller, and the four inferior bifurcated. All 

 the molars are cimply conical, and the toes of the fore feet almost immov- 

 able ; the membrane of the hind feet is lengthened out into a slip beyond 

 each toe ; all the nails are flat and slender. 



Ph.jubata, Gm. ; Sea Lion of Steller, Pernetty, &c. ; BufF. Supp. 

 VII. xlviii. From fifteen to twenty feet, and more, in length; fawn 

 coloured; the neck of the male covered with hairs that are more 

 frizzled and thickly set than those on the rest of the body. It might 

 be said to be found in all the Pacific Ocean, were it not that those 

 from the straits of Magellan seem to differ from such as are taken at 

 the Aleutian islands. 



Ph. ursina, Gm. ; Buff. Supp. VII. xlvii. (The Sea Bear). Eight 

 feet long, no mane, varying from brown to whitish. From the north 

 of the Pacific Ocean. Other seals are found in that sea which only 

 differ from the ursina in size and colour : such is the Petit phoque 

 noir of Buffon (Ph. pusilla), Buff. XIII. liii; the Yellow Seal of 

 Shaw, &c. 



* The mechanism by which this inflation is effected is not yet well understood. 

 See Dekay and Ludlow, Annals of the New York Lyceum, Vol. I. pp. 94 and 99. 



f^ (n) A much more full and interesting account of the Sea Elephant, under the 

 title of Plioca proboscidea, is given by two recent French travellers, Peron and Le 

 Sueur. This is the species of seal which forms the great material of the English 

 seal fishers off the islands in the neighbourhood of New South Wales. The fishery 

 is now carried on periodically, and its object is to obtain the Sea Elephant, not on 

 account of its flesh, but for the skin and oil which it is capable of yielding. The 

 flesh is insipid and black, but still is consumed by the natives; the tongue alone is 

 preserved by the English seamen; for, when properly cured, it is sold as a precious 

 luxury. The fresh blubber of this animal is in the highest esteem amongst the 

 sailors, as an easy, speedy, and most successful local remedy in all sorts of wounds. 

 The travellers just mentioned were informed by the Englishmen engaged in this oc- 

 cupation at the island of King, that the animal, as soon as it has been killed, is 

 skinned and sliced into aniall cube-shaped pieces, which are boiled in cauldrons ai'- 



