ORDER CARNASSIER. 495 



of the Phoc^e or Seals ; nor when we consider the existing 

 state of ignorance in relation to so many other Mammalia, 

 more, in fact, within our reach than these marine animals, 

 can we be surprised that but little should be known about 

 them. Governments, societies, or individuals of wealth and 

 power, may send out men of science to explore the most 

 distant countries ; and scientific zeal may stimulate others 

 to investigate the wonders of nature, in her most seques- 

 tered recesses, but we have not the means, except by de- 

 duction and analogy, of ascertaining the habits of these 

 half amphibious animals, while procuring their sustenance 

 at the bottom of the sea ; nor have we often, or in an effi* 

 cient manner, the opportunity of watching them in their 

 favourite haunts, the isolated steril rock, or the most retired 

 and deserted strand. 



Many reasons seem to concur in pointing to the situation 

 of the Phocse, in artificial arrangement, as among the other 

 marine Mammalia ; it seems an easy transition from them 

 through the Dugong to the Cetacea, and, in fact, Illiger 

 has so arranged them under the general name of Pinne- 

 pedie, but it is far from our wish to invent new systems, or 

 even to reform the old ; we shall merely observe, that such 

 a transposition of these animals, as that alluded to, might, 

 perhaps, be made with advantage to the general symmetry 

 of the Cuvierian system. 



Until very lately, the Seals were not supposed to present 

 any very decided physical grounds of diversity. The pre- 

 sence or absence of an external ear, no very influential cha- 

 racter, had, indeed, been employed to separate the Seals, 

 properly speaking, from the Otarys, the former, as was 

 supposed, wanting the external ala, and the latter having 

 it ; and a further sub-division of these Seals, properly 

 speaking, has been still more recently made, by a separating 

 those species which had an elongated snout, or a cutaneous 

 appendage to the head, from such as had neither. 



