t20 



MR. R. LYDEKliEH ON 



the eating away of the case. Furthermore, if the case be water- 

 tight, the presence of this possibly largely fluid mass may be 

 advantageous to the spermatozoa, especially if their sojourn in the 

 spermatophore be long. Its function may be to keep the sperm 

 moist and active. This is, however, mere supposition, and so 

 little is known about the processes of fertilisation in the Oligo- 

 chfeta that no safe guess can be hazarded. But it seems clear fiom 

 the large mass of granulai- substance that it plays some important 

 function in fertilisation. 



22. A Hare Beaked Whale. 

 By B. Lydekker. 



[Eeceived December 19, 1910: Kead Marcli 7, 1911.] 



(Text-figures 137-139.) 



Some months ago — I believe early in the present year — a Beaked 

 Whale was stranded on the beach near Port Elizabeth, which 

 fortunately came under the notice of Mr. F. W. FitzSimons, the 

 Director of the Museum in that city. Photographs were taken of 

 the specimen as it lay, and the skeleton was subsequently cleaned 

 and placed on exhibition in the Museum. As it lay, the specimen 

 measured 15-^ feet in length, fi'om the tip of the muzzle to the end 



Text-fiR-. 137. 



Mesoplodon {Dioplodon) grayi as it lay on the beach. 

 The back-fill had been hacked by nati\'es. 



of the flukes. In colour it was jet-black all over ; and the flukes 

 was remarkable on account of the posterior border being convex, 

 instead of deeply emarginate, as in ordinary cetaceans. The skull, 

 of which Mr. FitzSimons forwarded the two photographs herewith 

 i-eproduced, indicates that the specimen is referable to the genus 

 Meso2ilodon (as commonly understood) ; this being manifest from 



