160 PROF. W. H. FLOWER ON THE ELEPHANT SEAL. [Jan. 4, 



same genus, especially as each subdivision contains but a single well- 

 marked species ; but as the separation has now been so generally 

 adopted, and the name Macrorhinus has become so deeply rooted in 

 zoological literature, perhaps more inconvenience would result from an 

 attempt to reunite them than to retain them as distinct genera, and 

 we may be content to show their close affinities by their union in one 

 subfamily, Cystophnrince. 



The Elephant Seal has been known in zoological literature 

 by three specific names, viz. : — leonina, Linn., founded on the so- 

 called " Sea-Lyon " of Juan Fernandez, described and figured in 

 Anson's Voyage, 1748, and undoubtedly the species under considera- 

 tion ; elephantina, Molina, 1782, revived by Gray ; and proboscidea, 

 Peron, 1815. The former, though, perhaps, the least appropriate, is 

 clearly the first in point of time ; and as in using it we are not resus- 

 citating a name that has become obsolete, or been entirely superseded 

 by another that has met with general acceptance, it may be adopted 

 with equal respect to the laws of priority and convenience ; in fact 

 all recent zoological literature shows that this name is gaining ground 

 over both the others which have been proposed as substitutes. 



Unity or Plurality of Species. — The Elephant Seals which inhabit 

 the Pacific coast of North America, formerly abundant, but now 

 extremely reduced in numbers by the persecutions of the sealers, 

 are supposed by Theodore Gill to be specifically distinct from those 

 of the southern hemisphere, and have received the name of Macro- 

 rhinus angustirostris^. 



In J. A. Allen's valuable and exhaustive monograph on the North- 

 American Pinnipeds this distinction is adopted ; but although the 

 author speaks of the two species as presumably distinct, he says that, 

 " so far as can be determined by descriptions, the Northern and 

 Southern Sea-elephants differ very little in size, colour, or other 

 external features." From evidence not very satisfactory, he supposes 

 the southern species to be on the whole somewhat the larger of 

 the two. The osteological characters upon which Gill bases his 

 distinction are derived from the conjparison of the skull of a pro- 

 bably full-grown female Californian Seal with the figure given by 

 Gray in the ' Zoology of the Erebus and Terror,' of a two-thirds 

 grown male (the one now in the British Museum) from the South 

 Seas. This is incorrectly described by Gray as an "adult female ;" 

 and Gill has accepted this determination without question, although 

 the characters of the skull, as seen in the drawing, the unworn 

 condition and size of the canines, and open state of the sutures are 

 sufficient to throw much doubt upon it. Unfortunately there is 

 no skull of an adult female Sea-elephant in this country available 

 for comparison ; but from what may be inferred from other species 

 of Seals, and from the evidence afforded by young specimens, it may 

 be considered almost certain that the very character on which Gill 

 has chiefly relied for specific distinction is a sexual one. The com- 

 parative narrowness of the muzzle is associated with the smaller deve- 



1 Proc. Essex Inst. v. 1866, p. 13 ; Proc. Chicago Acad. Sci. i. 1866, p. 33. 



