332 MR. R. BROWN ON THE MAMMALS OF GRKENLAND. [May 28, 



companied the Swedish Expedition of Otto Torell to Spitzbergen*. 

 He has added, incidentally, not a little to our knowledge ; but his 

 treatise is mostly a compilation, and, not looking upon the arctic 

 fauna in a comprehensive view, he has fallen into many errors in zoo- 

 geography. For instance, I cannot uLderstand why he has excluded 

 Balanoptera gigas, Eschr., and B. roatrata. Fab., from the Spitz- 

 bergen fauna, nor still less why BalcBna mysticetus, Linn., is not 

 classed among the Mammals of the seas around. This last is 

 assuredly found there. In Smeerenberg Bay the Dutch used to 

 catch it in abundance, and even erected boiling-houses on shore to 

 " try " out its oil ; and the two former are also found there. Indeed 

 nearly all of the Greenland marine Mammalia are also found in Spitz- 

 bergen ; and certainly Dr. Malmgren's stay was much too short to 

 allow him to come to any decision on the matter. 



Eschricht and J. T. Reinhardt's memoirs on the Greenland Whale f 

 have added directly to our knowledge ; while the numerous papers 

 and catalogues of Gray J and Lilljeborg§ on the British and Scandi- 

 navian Cetacea (most of which are also found in Greenland) have 

 helped us to a right understanding of that order. TMilsson has dis- 

 entangled the northern Pinnipedia in his History of Scandinavian 

 Mammals II; and so has Gray^ and, more closely relating to Green- 

 land, Fabricius**, in a supplementary paper to his Fauna, and Dr. 

 Wallace in the short abstract of one read before the Royal Physical 

 Society of Edinburgh ff, on those killed by the northern Seal- 

 hunters. But nearly all of these papers are only local, or relate 

 merely to questions of specific distinctions and synonyms, and touch 

 but lightly upon the Seals either as animals of Greenland, or on their 

 migrations from one part of the Arctic regions to another. Our own 

 Arctic Expeditions halting little, if at all, on the Greenland coast, 

 and many of them being unprovided with competent naturalists, 

 have added almost nothing to our knowledge of the Arctic or Green- 

 land Mammals ; but (he American Expeditions to Smith's Sound, 

 under Drs. Kane;f:J and Hayes §§, have supplied us with many in- 

 teresting notes on the range and habits of species. I wish I could 

 say the same for all the describers of their collections. Professor 



* Svenska Expeditionen till Spetsbergen ar 1861, under ledning af Otto To- 

 rell — ar detagarnes Anteckningar och aiulra handlingar skildrad af K. Cheyde- 

 nius (Stockholm, 1865). Vide the account of the Walrus in that work, pp. 168- 

 183 (with plate and woodcut), the excellent figures of Nabblivalar {Hi/peroodon 

 hutsJcopf, Lac(5p.) facing p. 480, &c. 



t Eay Society's Memoirs on the Cetacea, 1866. 



\ Catalogue of Seals and Whales in the British Museum, 1866 ; and Pro- 

 ceedings of the Zoological Society, and Annals of Nat. Hist., ■passim. 



§ Kay Soc. Mem. Cet. 



II Skandinavisk Fauna, Forsta Delen, Daggadjuren, pp. 268-f$26 (1847;, also 

 translated in Wiegmann's Archiv fiir Naturgeschichte, Bd. vii. &c. 



^ Lib. et locc. citt. 



** Naturhistoriske Selskabets Skrivter, Bd. i. 



+t Proceedings of the Eoyal Physical Society of Edinb. 1862-63. 



II Arctic Explorations, 2 vols. J 855. 



§§ Voyage towai'ds the open Polar Sea (made in 1860), 1867. 



