514 PROF. FLOWER ON RUDOLPHl's RORQUAl,. [NoV, 20, 



Mr. J. T. Carrington, who saw it within two days of its capture, 

 describes the colour of its back as a rich glossy black, which shaded 

 to a brilliant white on the underparts, the flippers being black. The 

 animal was a male. 



When roughly cleaned, under Mr. Gerrard's superintendence, the 

 bones and some other parts were removed to the prosector's room 

 in the Society's gardens, where I had an opportunity of examining 

 them on the 1 7th. It then became perfectly evident that the animal 

 was a characteristic specimen of the species named above, apparently 

 not quite adult. 



The skull measured G feet 2 inches (1-880 m.) in length, and the 

 complete vertebral column 22 feet 3 inches (6-780 m.), giving 28 feet 

 5 inches (8-660 m.) from the apex of the I'ostrum to the end of the 

 Inst caudal vertebra in a straight line, all the intervertebral substances 

 being preserved. The lengthof the animal in the flesh may there- 

 fore be taken at about 29 feet (8*840 m.). The numbers of the 

 vertebrae of the different regions of the column were : cervical 7, 

 dorsal 13, lumbar 15, and caudal 21 ; or 56 in all. The upper end 

 of the first rib of both sides was deeply cleft into two distinct heads\ 

 the posterior of which was directly articulated to the end of the 

 transverse process of the first dorsal vertebra ; the anterior was 

 connected by a considerable mass of ligamentous substance to the 

 approximated terminations of the upper and lower transverse pro- 

 cesses of the posterior cervical vertebrae. It may therefore be 

 regarded as a cervical rib, the distal end of which has coalesced with 

 the first thoracic rib, a condition well illustrated by the specimen in 

 the Brussels Museum, described by me in the 'Proceedings' of the 

 Zoological Society, 1864, p. 417, where, on the right side, it is still 

 free". The thirteenth rib had a very small head, and was not 

 directly attached to the transverse process of the corresponding 

 dorsal vertebra, which showed no appreciable articular expansion 

 at its extremity as in all the preceding ribs. The sternum was small 

 and mainly cai tilaginous ; its length is but 7 inches, and its greatest 

 breadth not quite so much. Its form and mode of attachment to 

 the broad ends of the first pair of ribs are shown in the annexed figure 

 (p. 515) from a sketch made while they were still in connexion. The 

 ossified portion was a broad lozenge-shaped or oval nucleus, which 

 is all that remains in the hitherto described skeletons of immature 

 individuals, and gives very little idea of the real form of this ])art 

 of the skeleton. In perfectly adult animals the whole would pro- 

 bably ossify, and give a shape of sternum like that of Balcenoptera 

 rostrata, but with a shorter posterior limb to the cross. The 

 chevron bones were twelve in number. The stylo-hyals had the 



1 As in all the specimens of this species hitherto described, except that 

 recorded by Turner (Joiirn. Anat. & Physiol. April 1882). 



'^ As an additional illustration to the numerous cases already recorded of the 

 presence of cervical ribs in the Cetacea, I may mention tlaat in a specimen of 

 Titrdojjs tursio, prepared during the present year for the Museum of the Eoyal 

 College of Surgeons, there is a pair of such ribs, each 62 millim. in lengtli, arti- 

 culated to the extremities of the traiisverse processes of the seventh cervical 

 vertebra. 



