But wlieu lie takes tliis step iu search of knowledge, the 

 naturalist finds the osteology of cetaceous animals to he a very 

 difficult pursuit, not merely on account of the general unwieldi- 

 ness of the skeletons, but of the time and trouble necessary to 

 extract the oil with which their bones are saturated, and which 

 makes the preparation of them, as I can vouch, most offensive to 

 the senses. Perfect skeletons of the order of Getacca, or more 

 correctly Gete, are, therefore, in fact, very rare in museums. Of 

 animals said to be cachalots or sperm whales, perhaps the most 

 perfect skeleton hitherto described, is the one said by Beale to 

 belong to Sir ClifEord Constable, Bart., of Burton Constable, in 

 Yorkshire. Its carcass was cast ashore on the coast of that 

 county in 1825, and was described in the same year by Dr. 

 Alderson in a paper read before the Cambridge Philosophical 

 Society. 



Beale was the surgeon of a whaler, who, having made some 

 notes on the habits of the sperm whale of the Northern Pacific, 

 determined on his return to England, in 1833, to give an account 

 of its osteology. This, however, he appears to have studied for 

 the first and only time, not in any of those numerous whales he 

 had seen killed on the coast of Japan, but in Sir Cliftbrd Constable's 

 Yorkshire specimen, the skeleton of which had been set up 

 apparently in a very creditable manner by a Mr. Wallis, of Hull, 

 many years after the animal had been cast ashore. Now, this 

 Yorkshire skeleton, we shall give good reasons for believing to be 

 that of an animal different, not merely from our Sydney sperm, 

 but even from the true sperm whale of the coasts of Europe ; nor 

 is it likely to be the same as that of the sperm whale of Japan. 

 Beale was, no doubt, led into his mistake by -agreeing with most 

 observers since the time of Cuvier in considering Lacepede's 

 three genera, Gatodon, Physalus, and Fhyseter^^ and the several 

 species said to belong to them, as all referable to one species, 

 namely, the Physeter macrocephalus of Cuvier. But Cuvier him- 



* Physeter and Physalus arc classical words to express the blowing of 

 whales, and, therefore, are names applicable to all Cetacea. Catodon is a 

 modern name invented by Artedi, and adopted by Linnreus, to express 



