Mt'scellaneous. 683 



Dr. Webb has recently sent to me several large masses of the 

 integument of the creature, preserved fairly well in formalin. 

 These masses are from 3 to 10 inches thick, and, instead of being 

 muscular, as had been thought, they have a structure similar to 

 the hard elastic variety of blubber-like integument found on tho 

 head of certain cetaceans, such as the sperm-whale. They contain 

 very little oil and cannot be called true blubber. They are firm, 

 verv tough and elastic, and composed mainly of much interlaced 

 fibres and large bundles of tough, fibrous, white connective tissue. 

 They are difficult to cut or tear apart, especially where indurated 

 by partial drying. Some large irregular canals permeate the inner 

 and less dense portions of the thick masses. These may have con- 

 tained blood-vessels originally. From the inner surface of some of 

 the pieces large cords of elastic fibres proceeded inward. These 

 now hang loosely from the masses of integument. Dr. Webb states 

 that these were found attached on all sides to a long saccular organ, 

 which occupied most of the central cavity of the great mass. No 

 muscular fibres were present in the specimens sent. Perhaps the 

 muscular tissues of the inner surfaces, if any were present originally, 

 have decayed, but the tough fibrous mass does not show much 

 decomposition. The outer surface shows in some places a tough, 

 thin, grey, rather rough skin-like layer, that may be the remains of 

 the outer skin. It looks a little like the skin of some fisbes from 

 which the scales have been removed. From these facts 1 am led to 

 believe that the mass cast ashore is only a fragment, probably from 

 the head, of some huge vertebrate animal covered with a blubber- 

 like layer of great thickness. 



Although such an integument might, perhaps, be supposed com- 

 patible with the structure of some unknown fish * or reptile, it is 

 certain that it is more like the integument found upon the upper 

 part of the head of a sperm-whale than anything else that I know. 

 If we could imagine a sperm-whale with the head prolonged far 

 forward in the form of a great blunt saccular snout, freely projecting 

 beyond the upper jaw, and with a great central cavity, it might, if 

 detached and eroded by the surf, ])resent an appearance something 

 like the mass cast ashore. It hardly seems possible, however, that 

 the abruptly truncated and narrow snout of the common sperm-whale 

 could take on, even after being long tossed about by the waves, a 

 form like this. No whaler who has seen it has recognized it as 

 any part of a whale. It does not seem possible to identify such a 

 large, hollow, pear-shaped sac, 21 feet long, with any part of an 

 ordinary sperm-whale unless its noso had become enlarged and 

 distorted by disease, or possibly by extreme old age. No blowhole 

 was discovered. 



The specimen has now been moved several miles nearer to 

 St. Augustine and enclosed by a fence to protect it from the drifting 

 sand. It is likely to remain in nearly its present state for several 

 months more. — Amer. Journ. Sci., April IS'JT, pp. '65'), 35G. 



* The integument of Ort/iar/orisruf! moln, the great sun-fisli, is very 

 thick and elastic, but unlike this in structure. 



