90 MK. V. E. JIEDDARU ON THE 



Blackfish — a somewhat vague term for a whale, but apparently liere meaning a species 

 of Glohicephalus. The animal was 15 feet 3 inches in length, and of a black colour 

 with a light stripe on the belly. The rest of the description may be given in Sir 

 James Hector's own words : — " Pectoral fins situated immediately beliind the head, 

 each being 1 foot 3 inches long. 230 plates of baleen on each side, the largest being 

 18o inches by 1-8 inches at base and 01 inch thick ; colour of baleen yellowish white 

 witli a dark margin. Tiie ribs are at least seventeen pairs, and are very oblique. 

 Most of them are nearly straight, broad, and flat, and very small towards the point of 

 attachment, the form being suggestive of short swords or paper-knives, and from their 

 shape and light curvature very unlike ribs. The sternum is singular, bearing a striking 

 resemblance to a scutcheon, and appearing to have had only one rib-attachment on 

 each lateral border. The seven cervical vertebrae were thoroughly ankylosed." 



Mr, Traill held the whale to be a Finback { = Bal(enoptera), apparently because of 

 the dorsal fin, to which Sir James Hector does not allude in his transcription of 

 Mr. Traill's remarks, but refers to afterwards in characterizing the whale. The 

 skeleton of this individual came later into Hector's hands and was briefly described by 

 him with a number of illustrations in a " Postscript" to the same paper. The skeleton 

 did not, however, arrive in a complete condition, as is evidenced by the fact that 

 Plector only describes 15 pairs of ribs, while Traill asserted that there were 17 at least. 

 This skeleton is now in the Natural History Museum in London. A large number of 

 the important points are noted by Sir James Hector. I have, through, the kindness of 

 the Director of the Natural History Museum, been able to study this example and also 

 a much finer and apparently adult or nearly adult whale of the same species. This 

 specimen was purchased in January 1886 of Dr. Julius v. Haast. Upon both of these 

 some few notes have been made and published by Sir William H. Flower and Mr. B,. 

 Lydekker in their ' Mammals Recent and Extinct.' 1 have myself dealt briefly with 

 this form in ' A Book of Whales ' i. 



The skeleton described by Sir James Hector is so clearly that of a young animal, 

 that it would be impossible, or at least not at all desirable, to draw from its study a 

 final definition of the characters of this remarkable genus. Some of the characters are 

 plainly due to immaturity and would deceive no one ; others, on the other hand, would 

 not be known to be those of immaturity, unless an adult skeleton were there for 

 purposes of comparison. Sir James Hector uses, for example, the features of the 

 sternum in his description of the distinguishing characteristics of the genus. It 

 certainly bears no obvious signs of immaturity; but at the same time its entirely 

 different shape from the sternum of the large individual shows that this part of the 

 skeleton does undergo some changes during the process of its complete ossification, 

 unless, indeed, it be the case that the two individuals in the Natural History Museum 

 are really of different species ; but this conclusion hardly seems likely in view of the 



' Loudou, Johu Murray, lyOO. 



