Dr. J. E. Gray on the Eyes of the Emydide and Batrachia. 175 
some conical or small worn-down Whale’s teeth are named as if they 
belonged to this genus, or to the “ High-finned Cachalot,”’ as it is 
called ; but these teeth are not to be distinguished from the teeth 
of the younger true Sperm Whales. Mr. Wall, in his account of 
the Australian Sperm Whale, thinks the skeleton of the Whale at 
Burton Constable is the skeleton of a Blackfish; but Anderson, in 
his account of this animal, particularly says, ‘‘The nostrils were at 
the end of the snout,” and the skeleton is that of a true Catodon, as 
is proved by careful examination. 
It is to be hoped that some whaler will preserve the skull, if not 
some of the other bones, of the animal called the ‘ Blackfish,” 
which, according to the account of Sibbald, must yield a good quan- 
tity of spermaceti; for he mentions that four men were seen inside 
the cavity of the cranium extracting the sperm, or, as he calls it, 
“the brain.” Yet Beale, in his ‘ History of the Sperm Whale,’ spe- 
cially says, after well describmg the difference between the Sperm 
Whale and the Blackfish, that the latter does not produce spermaceti 
(p. 11). But I may observe that, according to Bennett and Nunn, 
in the Pacific the name of Blackfish is given also to the large Dol- 
phin described by me as Globiocephalus macrorhynchus. 
On THE Eyes or THE EMyDID#& AND BATRACHIA. 
By Dr. J. E. Gray, F.R.S., erc. 
There is no character that an animal offers that is not worthy of 
study ; and my attention has lately been called to the eyes of the 
freshwater Tortoises, and they have afforded me some information 
which I believe tobe important. All the paludinal Terrapens which 
I have been able to examine have a large square dark spot on each 
side of the iris. This spot, with the pupil, forms a dark band across 
the eyes. I have observed this to be the case in the species of 
Emys, Pseudemys, and Chrysemys; and on looking at Holbrook’s 
‘North American Herpetology,’ where the animals are all figured 
with care from life, we find that he represents and describes all 
the North American species of Hmydes as having this band across 
the eye. I may observe that I have also seen it in a South American 
- Tortoise, which I have called Geoclemys annulata ; and I think it 
is also found in Testudo scabra, another tropical American Terrapen 
with separate toes. These animals have been called Rhinoclemmys by 
Fitzinger. They are probably a natural genus, characterized by this 
peculiarity in the eyes. All the American species of Geoclemys, 
the two species of Cistudo figured by Holbrook, the estuarian Ter- 
rapen Malaclemys, the aquatic Box-Tortoises Kinosternon and Aro- 
mochelys, and the Lacertine Terrapens Chelydra and Macroclemys, 
have an annular iris without any interruption. It will be interesting 
to observe the eyes of the Asiatic and European species; but this 
ean only be relied upon in living specimens, as the spot on the 
angle of the eye is not to be observed in the specimens preserved 
in spirits, where only the circular pupil is distinctly marked even in 
the American Emydes. 
P.S. When this paper was read, it was observed that the Tritons 
