DR. J. MURIE ON THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CAAING WHALE. 291 
(G. macrorhynchus), the G. indicus, the G. sieboldii, and G. chinensis, some confusion 
evidently reigns. Dr. Gray says Mr. Blyth’s species (G. indicus) is “perhaps a 
Neomeris.” But his own trenchant definition of the latter genus, viz. “dorsal fin 
none,” does not harmonize with Blyth’s recorded dorsal fin 23 feet in length. I have 
alluded frequently to the anatomy of Dr. Williams’s Lewchew specimen, which agrees 
with the British G. melas; yet it is as likely as not to be the G. indicus, Blyth. 
As far as I can draw a conclusion from what has to me been satisfactorily demon- 
strated by others concerning Globiceps, there is but one (or two?) well-determined 
species inhabiting the basin of the Atlantic’. This is manifestly a migratory animal. 
That in the Pacific and Indian Oceans the species are more numerous is possible; 
but how much separation or identity of specimens from different localities are entitled 
to weight requires more research and comparison than the subject has hitherto received. 
As far as outward figure and colour are concerned, there appears considerable unifor- 
mity; but paucity of trustworthy observation may have something to do with this, if 
Couch’s? assertion is well founded. 
The precise position of the Cetacean dorsal fin would seem to be no sure specific 
test; for between foetus and mother there is no unanimity: in other words, its position 
depends pari passu on the age of the animal. 
Whilst the entire pectoral limb of the Whale is reduced to act in a watery mobile 
element, it acquires unusual power of a semirotatory kind. Professor Huxley* remarked 
of the Porpoise, “it is not, however, by any motion of those fins that locomotion is 
effected, this being almost exclusively produced by the sculling action of the tail.” 
True! still it seems to me that every movement must to some extent be influenced by 
these appendages. In nautical parlance, crank vessels require floats or outward balances. 
Now this is precisely the office of the semirigid extremity. It rotates, moreover, on its 
own axis, through the well-nigh ball-and-socket joint and fore-and-aft levers. 
Has subservience to function, preservation of type, selective power, or hereditary 
transmission had the most enduring influence in the transference of such a complex 
fleshy arrangement of the naso-facial muscles? Huddled up beneath a mass of blubber, 
? This opinion may seem very offhand as weighed against such authorities as Gray, Gervais, and van Beneden ; 
but the wide geographical range of G. melas makes one hesitate to accept distinction unless well founded. I 
regret the cessation of the text of the ‘Ostéographie des Cétacés,’ which, in spite of pls. 51 & 52, leaves a 
loophole of uncertainty. Burmeister’s Globiocephalus grayi (Anales, as cited, p. 367, pl. 21), as far as I can 
Judge from a study of his text and plates, seems specifically identified more by abnormality in dentition than by 
strikingly trenchant cranial distinctions; and that, as I have intimated above, is a point of weakness in 
diagnosis. Regarding Malm’s Globiocephalus propinquus (Svenska Kongl. Akad. 1871) I have not had an 
opportunity of mastering his differentiations. If, however, G. melas, as proved, ranges from the Polar seas to 
the Mediterranean, and possibly south of that, is it not probable the Gottenburg specimen may eventually turn 
out to be a variety of the common species? The skeletal changes from youth to age have yet to be worked 
out in Globiceps before species can be soundly established. 
? Corn. Fauna, p. 10, quoted by Gray. * Hunterian Lectures, 1856. 
VOL. VIlI.—PART Iv. February, 1873. 2T 
