200 FA%IILY OTARIID^. 



logue of Seals aud Whales (186G, p. 55), and tlie "Supplement" 

 to the same (1871, p. 25), which Mr. Scott gives as a synonym. 

 After quotmg Gray's description of A. falJdandiciis, he says: 

 " This IS clearly a species distinct from the common Southern 

 Fur Seal. . . . The specific name Falklandicus having 

 been appropriated almost by general consent for another ani- 

 mal, I beg to substitute that of Grayii.^'' The Arctocephalus 

 eidoplins is based on verbal information from Mr. Morris, an 

 experienced sealer, who informed him " that during his sealing 

 A'oyages he occasionally met with a fur-seal, which he and 

 those connected with him in the trade readily recognized as a 

 distinct kind by the diminutive size of the adult animal ; by 

 a topknot of hair on the crown of the head; and by the soft, 

 beautiful under-fur, unlike in colour to, and much more valua- 

 ble for articles of ladies' wear than that of any other fur-seal 

 they were in the habit of captimng." ' " This seal," continues 

 Mr. Scott, " appears to be rare, only a few specimens having 

 been taken ; some were seen on the south-east coast of New 

 Zealand, evidently stragglers driven far away from home. Mr. 

 Morris has been told that they were formerly common on the 

 shores of Patagonia and the Island of Juan Fernandez." With 

 all due deference to the opinions of Mr. Morris and Mr. Scott, 

 this information hardly forms a satisfactory basis for the erec- 

 tion of a new species in this obscure group, where external 

 characters, when well known, are of slight distinctive value. 

 The Arctocephalus euloplms can only be assigned to the category 

 of vaguely described and indeterminable species, of which the 

 writings of Peron, Desmarest, and Lesson were so prolific half 

 a century ago. Only six other species were recognized by Mr. 

 Scott, namely: 1. Arctocephalus ur sinus {=. Callorhmus ur si- 

 nus). 2. Arctocephalus falMandicus (embracing all the Southern 

 Fur Seals, with the exception of his two " new species," already 

 noticed). 3. ZalopMis gillespi. 4. Z.lohatus, 5. Otaria stelleri. 

 6. O.jubata (= 0. jubata and Phocarctos hooJctri Gray). 



In 1873, Dr. Graj^ described* a Eumctopias elongatus, based 

 in part on a skull from Japan he had the previous yeart referred 

 to U. stelleri, and in part on a young skull, also from Japan, 

 which, doubtless, is the same as the Otaria stelleri of Temminck 

 (Fauna JaiDonica). 



* Proc. Zool. Soc, 1873, p. 776. t Ibid., 1872, p. 738. 



