392 BALiENOPTERID^. 



CETA OEA . BAL^NOP TERID.E. 



(MYSTACOCETl.) 



Genus Megaptera (Gray, 1844). 



Generic Character. — Skin of throat and belly plaited ; a low obtuse dorsal 

 fin ; flippers very long, equalling a fourth or even a third of the whole length, 

 their edges undulated ; lips marked by a row of tubercles ; head broad and 

 flat. Cervical vertebrae usually free, acromion of scapular absent or rudi- 

 mentary. 



HUMP-BACKED WHALE. 



Megaptera longimana (Rudolphi). 



Specijic Character. — Black above, varied black and white below; flippers 

 wholly white; baleen black. Vertebrfe 53, ribs 14 pairs. Length of adult 

 about 50 feet. 



Balcena hoops, Fabricius {nee Linn.) Fauna Groenl. (1790), 36. 



,, longimana, Rudolphi, Mem. Ace. Berl., 1829, 133. 

 Megaptera ,, J. E. Gray, Zool. Erebus and Terror (1844), I., 17. 



Kyxihohalcma boops, Eschricht, Nord. Wallthiere (1849), 146. 

 Keporhah of Greenlanders. Puckelhval of Swedes. 



The Hump-backs and Rorquals or Fin-Whales con- 

 stitute the family Balanopteridee, distinguished by the 

 longitudinal plaits or folds which mark the skin of their 

 throats and bellies, and by the possession of a dorsal fin. 

 In this family the head is relatively smaller than in the 

 Right-Whales, and the jaws are less arched, the baleen 

 is short and twisted, the vertebra? of the neck are usually 

 separate, and the flipper has only four fingers. The 



