81 



X. — On a Specimen of Shark in the Museum of the 

 Royal Society, Van Diemen's Land. By A. Cross, 

 Esq., E.N. [Read Wi June, 1854.] 



When at Hobart Town in December 1852, in the 

 " Equestrian," convict ship, I noticed some fine specimens 

 of sharks in the Museum there : one in particular, peculiar 

 to the coast of Australia and New Zealand, which I iden- 

 tified as belonging to the genus Lamna, and which I 

 marked Lamna cornuhica ; giving the specimen the same 

 specific appellation as our English Porbeagle shark. There 

 is the spine, tail, and jaws of the fish in the Museum ; the 

 last remarkable for its armature of long, thick, nail-like 

 teeth, and the pointed form of the snout ; hence the shark 

 is called in Miiller and Keule's classification, Oxyrhina 

 gomphodon, — it is the Tilueron of the Spaniards, a species 

 of it being found in the Mediterranean, but not of the for- 

 midable dimensions of the Australian variety. 



In the British Museum they have the jaws of the latter, 

 but no complete specimen. I write this to send to Hobart 

 Town, for the purpose of having the name which I placed 

 on the specimen altered to Oxyrhina gomphodon, as I 

 should be sorry to mislead our friends in the Southern 

 Hemisphere by the term which I formerly applied to it, 

 so I trust Dr. Milligan will correct the labelling accordingly, 

 &c. &c. 



Alexander Cross, 



Surgeon, E. N. 

 Eochester, 

 23rd January, 1854, 



