NOTES AND QUERIES. 467 



down for £6 to Thomas Jewess, by whose exertions it had been secured. 

 As usual, decomposition rapidly set in, and in a few days the carcase was 

 taken down the river and buried in the mud. I went to see it on the 

 1st September, identified the species, and made a measured drawing of it 

 as it lay on its side. The general colour of the smooth skin of the upper 

 portion, the fins and the tail, was glossy black ; the underside from the 

 lower jaw, white or whitish, extending more or less to the genitalia, thus 

 bringing into strong relief the series of plications, or furrows, which extend 

 from the symphysis of the lower jaw towards the belly ; the margin of the 

 lower jaw wide and somewhat keeled in front ; the eye, as usual, small, 

 about the size of a bullock's ; the aperture of the two blow-holes large and 

 weli marked ; the wreath of baleen (whalebone) in the upper jaw was perfect 

 but short (as it appears generally in females), and the colour black, with 

 greyish hair on the inner margin, the shorter blades towards the beak 

 somewhat lighter in colour ; the pectoral fins long and narrow ; the dorsal 

 fin small and thin, but very curved, ending almost in a point, and deeply 

 emarginated behind. The following are the more important measure- 

 ments ; — Length, rostrum of lower jaw to end of tail, 32 ft. 2 in. ; of 

 upper jaw to end of tail, 31 ft. 7 in. ; of upper jaw to end of dorsal fin, 

 21 ft. 7 in. ; end of dorsal fin to end of tail, 10 ft. 6 in. ; rostrum of lower 

 jaw to eye, 6 ft. 2 in. ; eye to end of pectoral fin, 7 ft. 4 in. ; length of 

 pectoral fin, 3 ft. 4 in. ; width of ditto, 9 in.; base of dorsal fin, 15 in. ; 

 height of dorsal fin (from ridge of back), 9 in. ; length of tail flukes, 

 6 ft. 6 in.; girth at the eye, 12 ft. 6 in. ; at dorsal fin, 10 ft. ; baleen, 

 longest blades, outside length, 12jj in. ; inside (in curve), 15£ in. ; width 

 at attachment to maxilla, 4f in. From the above it is manifest that this 

 Whale was not fully grown, the average length of an adult being from 

 45 to 50 feet, but the body was plump and in good condition ; and it was 

 probably a straggler from the North Sea, where these Whales appear as 

 summer visitors. On the 28th August several Whales were stranded 

 near Hunstanton (Norfolk). The two stranded at Snettisham and Heacham 

 have been identified (p. 387), by Mr. T. Southwell, as old and young 

 females of the Bottlenose Whale, Hyperoodon rostratus. Another Whale, 

 about 37 feet in length, has also been reported at Sea View, Isle of Wight, 

 on 21st December, and from the description and photograph I have received 

 I think it is probably a young specimen of B. musculns. A male specimen 

 of Eudolphi's Rorqual was stranded on 19th October, 1887, at the Tilbury 

 Docks (Essex), which measured 35 ft. 4 in. ; and some notes on it which I 

 gave to the Essex Field Club were printed in the ' Essex Naturalist ' for 

 April, 1888. The skeleton is now prepared, and will shortly be removed 

 to the Natural History Museum at South Kensington. All the species of 

 Balanoptera are (as the name implies) distinguished by a dorsal fin and by 

 a series of plications on the throat extending towards the belly. The body 



