INTRODUCTION. 5 



In the catalogue of a museum formed in Stirling during the first 

 half of the last century by the late ^Nlr John Macfarlane, after- 

 wards transferred to the Smith Institute, is an entry, " Part of a 

 whale's skeleton found at Airthrey," which leads one to think that 

 some of the bones had been received there, though they cannot now 

 be identified. 



In 1823 the workmen employed in deepening a drain in Dunmore 

 Park exposed in the stiff clay subsoil a number of large bones of a 

 whale. ]Mr Blackadder and Mr Keddoch stated in the Edin- 

 burgh Nev) Philosophical Journal, vol. xi., 1824, that they were 

 about 2 feet from the surface, and from 23 to 24 feet higher than 

 tidal high-water mark. The bones were chiefly vertebree, and were 

 presented to Professor Jameson for his Museum. It would appear 

 from the New Statistical Accoimt of Scotland, vol. viii., 1842, that 

 whales' bones had been also found in 1817 to the north of the 

 mansion-house of Dunmore, upwards of a quarter of a mile from the 

 river bank. 



In October 1824 bones of a whale were exposed in Burnbank, on 

 the Blair Drummond estate, seven miles west from Airthrey, and 

 twelve miles from Dunmore. They were imbedded at a depth of 

 4 feet in the Carse clay, nearly a mile from the river Forth, and 

 within 400 yards of the boundary where the clay ends (Mr Home 

 Drummond and Mr Blackadder in Mem. Wernerian Soc, v., 1826). 

 The bones recognised were a large portion of the cranium, comprising 

 the occipital, frontal, and a part of the superior maxilla, also a scapula 

 and several vertebrae in a mutilated state. A part of a stag's horn, 

 perforated like that found with the Airthrey whale, accompanied 

 the bones, and the objects were presented to the Museum of the 

 University. 



Distinct records therefore exist that portions of the skeletons of 

 whales from three localities in the Carse of Stirling were presented 

 to the i!^atural History Museum between the years 1819 and 1824. 

 No catalogue of the fossilised bones seems to have been in existence 

 at the time when the University Collection was transferred to the 

 Museum of the Science and Art Department. 



It is, however, fortunate that the head bone specified in the 

 inventory in Mr Bald's letter preserves a label, "Airthrey Fossil 

 Whale," which identifies it as from that animal, and from it we can 

 form an idea of the magnitude of this whale. The specimen consisted 

 of the occipital bone, with its condyls and the foramen magiium, 

 together with the adjoining portions of the temporals. The large 

 supra-occipital sloped upAvards and forwards. Its posterior surface 

 was slightly concave ; it had in the mesial line a low ridge, and it is 

 ridged also on each side (figure, p. 6). 



At each side of the occipital a massive squamoso - zygomatic 

 temporal projected outwards for 2 feet 2 inches, and added materially 

 to the breadth in the teniporo-occipital region. I have compared 

 the diameters with the corresponding bones of the Longniddry 

 B. sibhaldi and of B. musey.lu'i : — 



