TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 143 



man ; but that is not its meaning. It is the walls of the ring which are developed 

 for ligamentous and muscular attachments. The lower processes he divided into 

 three stages, and compared these to three stages of the corresponding parts in man. 

 The ligaments between the axis, atlas, and occiput had been dissected, and he 

 demonstrated their modifications in the whales. One of the great whales was the 

 Peterhead Razorback noticed in the previous paper, the other had stranded at Wick 

 in 1869. The Pike whale, showing the deficient parts of the bony transverse pro- 

 cesses to be represented by fibrous bands, had stranded at Aberdeen last year. The 

 next specimens exhibited were from the Narwhal, male and female.' Possibly 

 in adaptation to the possession of the great tusk, the vertebra were moveable, 

 while in the female, without the tusk, they were less moveable. The male 

 showed also an additional joint, on the same side as the tusk, between the atlas and 

 axis. Passing next to the stiff-necked whales, Prof. Sti-uthers exhibited a large 

 series of specimens from the Globiocephalus, obtained from the flock which stranded 

 near Edinburgh some years ago. They showed progressive anchylosis of the ver- 

 tebrte, and degeneration of the ti-ansverse processes. The younger ones showed 

 even the rudiments of the epiphyses of the vertebral bodies, on vertebrse themselves 

 rudimentary. The last neck exhibited was that of a Right whale, the interest 

 attaching to which was that, though probably a Greenland Right whale, it presented 

 more of the characters of the Right whale of the South Sea. The conclusion he 

 drew from the study of this neck was that the supposed differences between the 

 Right whale of the North and South Seas were not so fixed characters as had been 

 supposed. 



On the Restoration of the Tail in Protopterus anneetens. 

 By Professor E. H. Teaquaik, M.D. 



Professor Traquair described two specimens of Protopterus annedens, in which 

 the external configuration and internal structure rendered it evident that a consi- 

 derable portion of the tail had been broken off, and that in the one case a less, and in 

 the_ other a gi-eater amount of restoration had taken place. In the first specimen, 

 which measured 8i inches in length, the body was truncated abruptly 3f inches 

 behind the origin of the ventral fins. This tmncated termination of the body was 

 fringed by a delicate membrane, projecting half an inch backwards in the middle, 

 and containing a pointed central axis. On dissection the abrupt truncation was 

 equally obvious in the internal parts ; and the fi-inging membrane, with its axis, 

 wasevidently a commencing restoration of the injured tail, the central axis con- 

 taining a minute newly formed notochord, lateral muscles, and spinal cord, but 

 there was as yet no new development of neural or hasmal arches, spines, fin-sup- 

 ports, fin-rays, or scales. In the second specimen, which measured 9f inches in 

 length, and had evidently been truncated or mutilated at a distance of about 

 71 inches from the tip of the snout, or If inch from the origin of the ventral 

 fins, the restorative process had proceeded to a much greater length. Although 

 the boundary between the old and new textures was sufiiciently indicated on 

 the outside of the fish, by the sudden diminution in the thickness of the specimen 

 and in the size of the scales, the outline of the posterior extremity of the animal 

 was very well restored, thovigh the whole tail was still proportionately shorter than 

 if no mutilation had taken place. The restored portion of the tail measured 2} 

 inches in length, and on dissection showed not only, as in the former case, a 

 reproduction of the notochord, but also of the neural and hasmal arches, spines, and 

 fin-supports, these elements remaining, however, entirely cartilaginous, and being 

 much more irregidarly disposed than in the normal tail. They also cease to be 

 traceable after 1^ inch from the commencement of the new portion of the tail, 

 though the notochord proceeds to its ultimate filiform termination. In addition 

 the spinal cord, tlie lateral muscles, and the fin-rays and their muscles were in 

 this specimen reproduced as well as the scales on the external surface. Both 

 externally and internally the line of demarcation between the old and new textures 

 was distinctly seen. 



