1901.] BONNET or THE SOUTHERN EIGHT WHALE. 45 



It is an interesting fact that the "bonnet" appears to be 

 confined to the Southern Eight Whale. Gray has expressed his 

 inability to find mention of the strncture many account of the 

 Sreenknd Whale; and the, experienced whal:ng captain Mr. 

 Eobert Kinnes of Dundee writes, m a letter dated Oct 4, 19UU, 

 that " the Greenland Whale has no excrescence on us nose 

 What is still further of interest is the fact that m the Whale 

 figured by Gray in Dieffenbach's ' Travels m New Zealand vol n 

 a" BalJna aJtipodarum, there is a prominence on the front o^ 

 the lower iaw as well as on the front of the upper one 



The specimens are black in colour, and very irregular m shape 

 Two views of the larger specimen are now exhibited (see figs. 1 and 

 9 Plate VI.). The under surface is comparatively smooth, and the 

 formatle area is rather narrower than the total width of the 



'To the' naked eye the mass appears to be made up of a number 

 of thin layers of horny matter, for m the dried condition the edges 

 s em disposed to fra/ out in lamina. But by a study of micro- 

 scopic preparations the structure is seen to be one of closely packed 

 fibres or rods, disposed at right-angles to the broader surface of 

 the mass Each constituent is rod-hke for the greater part of irs 

 length but is slightly hollow towards the cutaneous surface ; ana 

 nfhe cavity there doubtless resided a soft and vascular papilla, 

 covered with prismatic epithehal cells, to the proliferating activity 

 of which the increase in the bulk of the " bonnet is due 



Sections taken at, right angles to the fibres (Plate VI. fig 3) fail 

 to show any sharply defined outlines between these constituents, 

 the main indications of their structure being the dark air-spaces 

 arranged in concentric series. Very little can be made out by 

 the use of sections taken at right angles to the cutaneous surface, 

 for probably owing to contraction in drymg, the rods are bent 

 and twisted in all directions, and it is not possible to ti-ace any 

 individual one for more than a fractional part of its total length 



Beddard » has called attention to the resemblance which this 

 form of structure bears to that of the nasal horn of the Ehinoceros, 

 which has always been regarded as consisting of agglutinated coarse 

 horny fibres, differing from true hairs in the fact that their papilla 

 are not lodged in depressions, but exist as eminences on the sur- 

 face of the skin. The constituent rods or fibres of the Ehinoceros 

 horn, however, are sharply defined by intermediate agglutinating 

 n^aterial of darker appearance (Plate VI fig. 4 : see also Daube^ton 

 Hist. Nat. de Bufion, ed. 8vo, xxiv. p. 269, pi. 318. figs. 3-7), and 

 of a less resistant nature than the fibres themselves, tor the latter 

 tend to fray out on the basal parts of the horn. 



The formation of horny growths of considerable thickness by the 

 activity of closely-set papiilse, giving rise to coarse horny fibres or 

 hairs connate from the first, is, however, by no means uncommon 

 among Mammals. It occurs in the hoof of the Horse (fig. 5 : see 



Book of Whales,' 1900, p. 136. 



