618 PHOCA FGETIDA RINGED SEAL. 



adopted, it appears to me that, on the whole, preference should 

 be given to Mspida, on account of priority 5 for although the 

 earliest descrii)tions under this name are very meagre and in- 

 accurate, they are avowedly founded on the Neitsek of Cranz, 

 the appellation by which this Seal is known to the Greenlanders 

 to this day, according to Mr. R. Brown,* and are therefore in- 

 tended for this species, and especially because Fabricius, in 

 1790 [1791], definitely adopted the name, withdrawing that of 

 fcetida. I am further strengthened in this opinion," he con- 

 tinues, "by finding that those eminent Danish naturalists Steen- 

 strupt and Eeinhardt| both use Mspida when speaking of this 

 Seal." As regards use, although good authorities have adopted 

 hisjnda, by far the greater number of writers, including equally 

 eminent authorities, among them Lilljeborg and OoUett among 

 recent Scandinavian writers, adopt /ce^w/a. The question is cer- 

 tainly pretty evenly balanced. Granting, however, that the in- 

 troduction of the two names was practically simultaneous, and 

 that fcetida, as first given, was unaccompanied by a description, 

 while Mspida had this backing, it is admitted that neither the 

 description nor the figure is of any value in determining what 

 species was intended, and that the Greenland name Xeitsek is 

 the only clew to what was meant. Just this clew, backed by the 

 best authority Fabricius himself we have also in the case of 

 fcetida, while the first real description (in "Fauna Groenland- 

 ica," 1780) of the species was given under this name, and eleven 

 years before the species was recognizably described under the 

 name Mspida (by Fabricius in 1791). Fabricius gave as his 

 reasons for withdrawing the name fcetida and adopting Mspida 

 that the latter was not only an appropriate name but also the 

 oldest, although he ascribes the name Mspida to Erxleben. It 

 would seem, however, that he really adopted the name from Pen- 

 nant, considering Pennant's name " Rough Seal" a strict equiva- 

 lent of Phoca Mspida.^ The name fcetida api^ears certainly to 

 be most characteristic. 



* " 'On the Seals of Greenland,' P. Z. S., 1868, p. 414." 



t" ' Melketandsaittet hos Remmesieleu, Svartsiden, og Fjordsteleu (Phoca 

 iariata, 0. Fabr., FJi. gronlandica, O. Fabr., og Ph. hispida, Sclir.),' Vid. 

 Medd. f. d. Naturh. Forening, 1860. Kjobh. 18G1, s. 251-261." 



t " ' Om Klapmydsens ixlodte Norge og deus MelketandssBt,' Natm-li. Foren. 

 Vidensk. Meddelelser, 1G4." 



As being of interest in this connection I submit the following rendering 

 of F'abriciiis's opening paragraph of his history of the Fiordsa>l : ' 'This, next 

 to the Black-side, is the species -which is most numerously met with in Green- 

 land. 1 give to it the Danish uamejblordsail, because it keeps mostly in the 



