THE MERMAID. 229 



the amende honorable, and frankly accepting Jack's intro- 

 duction to his fish-tailed innamorata, classed these three 

 animals together as a sub-order of the animal kingdom, 

 and bestowed on them the name of the Sirenia. This was, 

 of course, in allusion to the Sirens of classical mythology, 

 who, in later art, were represented as having the body of a 

 woman above the waist, and that of a fish below, although 

 they were originally figured as having wings at their 

 shoulders, and the lower portion of their body like that of 

 a bird. 



It has been found difficult to determine to which order 

 these Manatidcz are most nearly allied. In shape they most 

 closely resemble the whale and seals. But the cetacea 

 are all carnivorous, whereas the manatee and' its relatives 

 live entirely on vegetable food. Although, therefore, Dr. 

 J. E. Gray, following Cuvier, classed them with the cetacea 

 in his British Museum catalogue, other anatomists, as 

 Professor Agassiz, Professor Owen, and Dr. Murie, regard 

 their resemblance to the whales as rather superficial than 

 real, and conclude from their organisation and "dentition 

 that they ought either to form a group apart, or be classed 

 with the pachyderms the hippopotamus, tapir, etc. with 

 which they have the nearest affinities, and to which they 

 seem to have been more immediately linked by the now 

 lost genera, DinotJwrium and Halitherium. With the 

 opinion of those last-named authorities I entirely agree. I 

 regard the manatee as exhibiting a wonderful modification 

 and adaptation of the structure of a warm-blooded land 

 animal which enables it to pass its whole life in water, and 



Steller. This supposition was, however, incorrect, for Professor Nor- 

 denskiold, when he visited Behring's Island in the "Vega," in 1879, 

 obtained evidence of a living rytina having been seen as recently 

 as 1854. 



