174 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



was still quite fresh. It was a female, 16 ft. 8 in. from tip of the snout to 

 the notch of the tail. Girth at the thickest part of the bod}' just in front 

 of the dorsal fin, as near as I could measure it, about 9 ft. Width of the 

 tail part of the body, near the root of tbe flukes, 2 ft. From tip to tip of 

 the tail flukes, 4 ft. From snout to dorsal fin, 5 ft. Eye very small, 4 in. 

 from angle of the mouth. Flippers very narrow and pointed, 3 ft. 9 in. in 

 length. The weight was supposed to be about two aud a half tons by the 

 men who hauled it up on the beach. The inside of the mouth was covered 

 with hard blunt tubercules like shagreen. The colour was deep black, 

 with a heart-shaped mark on the throat of a light greyish white, continued 

 in a streak along the belly to the vent. When cut up it yielded about 

 half a ton of blubber, which in some places was Gin. thick. My friend 

 Mr. P. 0. Hutchinson, of Sidmouth, who kindly assisted me in obtaining 

 all information possible about the animal, was zealous enough to keep 

 watch and ward over the bones, so that none might be lost, when the 

 carcase was boiled down, and a member of the Committee of this Institu- 

 tion having generously furnished funds for purchasing them, I hope to get 

 the skeleton put together. The scapulars are extremely thin in the centre, 

 and of very soft spongy bone. They are curiously corrugated across the 

 blade. There are fifty-eight vertebrae (two or three more than stated by 

 Bell aud Gray), the last caudal being very small. All the cervical 

 vertebra? are anchylosed together, the centre of the two last only being 

 free. The teeth are {§-{<}, and extremely deciduous, the alveoli being very 

 shallow, and filled witli a dark-coloured spongy substance. The basi- 

 thyrohyal bone of the tongue is very large for the size of the animal. The 

 figure given in the second edition of Bell's ' British Quadrupeds ' is not 

 good, as it fails to show the remarkably broad, compressed form of the 

 hinder portion of the body or tail, and the flukes are badly drawn. The 

 dorsal fin is very different in the figure from the natural form. The only 

 recorded occurrence of this species on the Devonshire coast that I have 

 met with is the one mentioned by Bellamy (Nat. Hist. South Devon, 

 p. 196) as having been captured off Plymouth, April, 1839. The following 

 are the measurements of the skull of the Sidmouth specimen : — Total 

 length of skull, 28$ in. ; length from snout to blow-hole, 17 in. ; length of 

 teeth-series, 6 in. ; length of lower jaw, 1 9£ in. : width at notch, 9 in. ; 

 width at orbit, 16 in. ; width of intermaxillary, 6£ in. ; width at middle of 

 snout, 8 in.; height at occiput, 12 in. — W. S. M. D'Uiiban (Albert 

 Memorial Museum, Exeter). 



BIRDS. 



Hybrid between the Lesser Black-back and Herring Gulls.— The 

 hybrid between these two gulls mentioned by me at p. 450 of ' The 

 Zoologist' for 1881 as having been bred in my pond iu May, 1880, aud 



