14 Proceedincjs of the Uoyal Physical Society. 



II. Notes on the White-beaked Doli^hin (Delphinus (Lagen- 

 orliynclms) albiiostris). By Professor Sir Wm, Turner, 

 M.B., LL.D., r.RS. 



(Read 19th December 1888.) 



The white-beaked dolphin, although it has for a number of 

 years been known to frequent the east coast of England,^ 

 has only recently been recognised as a denizen of the Scot- 

 tish waters. When the late Mr E. R. Alston published his 

 " Eauna of Scotland " ^ in 1880, its occurrence on the coast of 

 Scotland had not apparently been recorded. 



In September 1879, whilst Mr J. Y. Buchanan was return- 

 m^ from the closincr cruise of the Northern Yacht Club, he 

 shot in Kilbrennan Sound, Eirth of Clyde, a cetacean which 

 formed one of a school that came into close proximity with 

 his yacht.3 The animal, he wrote to me, was 7 feet 9 inches 

 long, 5 feet in greatest girth, and weighed 318 lbs. The 

 colour was white on the belly, and blackish-grey on the back, 

 whilst the fins and tail were leathery black. In the month 

 of December Mr Buchanan kindly forwarded the skull to 

 me, and from a comparison made shortly afterwards with 

 crania in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of 

 England, it was obvious that the animal was an adult white- 

 beaked dolphin. This specimen w^as therefore, I believe, the 

 first of the species to be recognised in Scottish waters.^ 

 In September 1880 a young male was captured near the 

 Bell Rock, off the mouth of the Tay, and was presented to 

 the Kelvingrove Museum, Glasgow. It was described shortly 

 afterwards by Mr J. M. Campbell,^ and is the first Scottish 



^ Specimens have been described by Messrs Brightwell, J. E. Gray, Murie, 

 D. J. Cunningham, J. AV. Clark, and T. Southwell. 



2 Glasgow, January 1880. 



'^ 1 may state, that whilst yachting in August 1887 at the entrance to 

 Kilbrennan Sound, my yacht steamed through a school of dolphins, which 1 

 believed to be the white-beaked dolphin. 



* This animal is No. 19 in the list of specimens of this cetacean captured in 

 British waters, drawn up by Mr Thos. Southwell. (Trans. Norfolk and 

 Norwich Naturalists' Soc, , vol. iv., 1885.) 



** Natural History Society of Glasgow, November 30, 1880, and Scoflish 

 Naturalist, January 1881. The stomach and some other viscera of this 

 specimen are described by Professor Cleland in the Jouriml of Anatomy and 

 Physiolot/i/, vol. xviii., 1884. 



