GILPIN ON THE SEALS OF NOVA SCOTIA. 383 



with a nyctitating membrane from the inner corner. T could 

 easily pull the uper lid over the eye, though Dekay says of his 

 specimen it had none. Close behind the eye, was an orifice for the 

 ear well covered with hair which ran down its interior. A finger 

 might easily have been put into it, but less than an inch from 

 the surface it would be stopped by a membranous valve like 

 tragus. The muzzle blunt and hairy, slightly turned, was orna- 

 mented by rows of thick brownish bristles. Three bristles of the 

 same kind were above the eye. These bristles were wavy, from 

 slight prominences or thickning alternately on either side. The 

 nostrils were perpendicular, parallel or scarcely converging below. 

 The fore flipper was two feet three inches from end of nose, very 

 small, (ten inches long) scarcely showing the carpus from beyond 

 the integuments, and divided into five distant toes with webs 

 between. The toes were all armed with sharp nails or claws, the 

 longest, one inch and a quarter long, pearly white and very sharp, 

 and just reaching beyond the fur. The first toe is the longest, and 

 they gradually shorten to the fifth. The fur is longer upon the 

 flippers than on the body, yet it looks very small comparing it with 

 the rise of the body. The hind flipper is fourteen inches long, 

 containing five toes connected by webs, each toe has a small pearly 

 white rudimentary nail and the two outside toes the longest, the 

 middle shortest, and the webs when stretched out a darker color 

 than the fingers. The tail was about eight inches long and dropped 

 between the hind flippers. There were four abdominal mammoe hid 

 in the fur and about flve inches apart in two rows. As regards 

 color, when wet the head fore and hind flippers are black. The 

 back and sides have irregular black patches running into each other on 

 a greyish blue ground. The neck has a checquered look from the 

 spots being smaller and the belly a lighter hue, from there being 

 fewer of them. When dry this greyish ash becomes pale fawn, 

 that is in life, the seal basking in the sun. The dead skin seen at 

 the fur dealers has a greenish hue added. In life the whole surface 

 has a smooth plastered look which in the dead skin becomes rough 

 and uneven. Xearly all the colored drawings of seals represent 

 them in life but colored after the stufled specimen or dead skin at 

 the dealers, and hence has arisen the confusion of color and the 



