36 ESCHRICHT AND REINHARDT 



■were the animals found on the whale caught, as we have just mentioned, between New- 

 foundland and Iceland, a proof that this whale did really belong to the species to which it was 

 assigned.^ 



Some information about the " Sardc," of a more recent date, is to be found in the celebrated 

 work : ' Traité general des Peches,' by Duharael de Monceau. It is true we cannot here find 

 out such positive and sharp characteristics for this right-whale as from the two important 

 statements printed by Purchas, yet the work has its own value, and we shall, therefore, quote the 

 author's own words : 



"Comme les pecheurs qui vont chercher ces poissons vers le nord seroient fréquemment 

 exposes å des dangers considerables, a caiise des glaces qui rendent la peche penible et incertaine, 

 comme nous I'avons représenté (PI. VIII, fig. 1), ceux qui pratiquent leur metier dans ces 

 parages ne font communement la peche que dans le moi de Mai, Juin, et Juillet, saison oil Pon 

 n'a point å craindre les gelées; méme aujourd'hui (1769) on va communement chercher les 

 Baleines dans des parages moins froids, quoique celles qu'on y trouve, qu'on nomme Sardes et qui, 

 par la description qu'on donnent les auteurs, ne paroissent etre le poisson qu'on a appellé Nord- 

 Jcaper, soient moins grosses, moins chargées de graisse, et beaucoup plus vives et plus fuyardes que 

 les grosses qu'on prend dans le Nord." And further we read :— " Nous avons dit que nos 

 pecheurs distinguent principalement deux especes de vraies et franches Baleines : Les premieres 

 sont les grosses du Nord ; celles de la seconde espece, qui sout connues en quelques endroits sous 

 le nom de Sarde ou Nord-Jcaper, sont beaucoup plus petites, puisque les plus grosses ne 

 produisent, au plus, trente barrils d'huile ; et comme elles sont vives et farouches, elles sont bien 

 difficiles å attraper; néanmoins, quand la peche des grosses Baleines n'a pasréussi, les pecheurs 



^ Darwin, who, in his great work upon the Cirripeds, is as unwilling as his predecessors to admit the 

 existence of more than a single species of flat Coronula, viz. the C. balænaris (Gm), is inclined to confine 

 its range to the Southern Hemisphere, and believes that, at any rate, it is only in the Pacific that it 

 may have found its way also to the Northern Hemisphere (A Monograph on the sub-class Cirripedia. 

 The Balanidæ, London, 1854, p. 417). As he, nevertheless, refers the "Nordkaper coronula" of 

 Chemnitz to this species, and quotes the description and illustrations of this conchologist (Syst. 

 Conch. Cab. 8th vol. p. 325, fig. 845, 846), relative to C. balænaris ; he must have overlooked the fact 

 that Chemnitz got his specimens from the Northern Atlantic, and that the species must be cosmo- 

 politan, at least if the synonymy given is correct. But this seems to be doubtful. The figures given 

 by Chemnitz of the " Nordkaper coronula" are scarcely sufficient to prove its identity with the species 

 found on the right-whales of the Pacific, and until the question has been settled by a direct compari- 

 son of the shells themselves, we may be permitted to doubt that animals living in seas so widely 

 separated, and on whales of different species, are really of the same kind. Fortunately all uncertainty 

 on this head may, most probably, still be removed, as one of the identical Corouulas before mentioned 

 was presented by Chemnitz to Spengler the conchologist, and this most important original 

 specimen is still to be found (if we are not mistaken) with the rest of his collection, in the Royal 

 Museum of Copenhagen. 



"Whether, in the case that the Coronula balænaris, Auct, should prove to be a collective species, the 

 " Nordkaper- coronula" of Chemnitz is really the same animal &5 th.e Balanus polythalamius compla- 

 natus described by AYalch, or whether the latter might have been taken from one of the right-whales 

 of the Pacific, and in that case most likely from the Cape whale, cannot well be decided, unless the 

 original specimen, described by Walch, still exists, and can be again examined. 



