100 — Transactions.— Zoology. 
are soldered together, and have all the peculiar characteristics of the Australian 
species, whilst it has only 12 dorsal (instead of 14), 11 lumbar (instead of 9), 
and 20 caudals with 8 chevron bones attached (instead of 21). 
The Australian species has 14 ribs, whilst the New Zealand species has 
only 12, of which the first one is broad and flat, and has, like the 2nd, 3rd, 
4th, 5th, and 6th, two articulating surfaces; whilst, according to MacLeay, the 
Australian species has only one articulating surface on the first rib. The 
second rib still exhibits a considerable breadth, whilst the succeeding ones 
become gradually narrower. The last six ribs, which assume a rounded shape, 
possess only one articulating surface. 
Thus, even supposing that the minor differences in the form of the skull 
might, perhaps, be due to sex, the number, arrangement, and the form of the 
vertebre and ribs alone would prove the distinct specific character of the New 
Zealand specimen, for which, therefore, I wish to propose the specific name of 
Luphysetes pottsii, in honour of T. H. Potts, Esq., F.L.S., by whom the specimen 
was secured to science, 
The contents of the stomach consisted of a dark slimy matter, from which 
no clue could be obtained as to the usual food of the species under review; but 
we may conclude, from the absence of the horny beaks of Cephalopods, of 
which some years ago we obtained nearly half a bushel in the stomach of 
Berardius arnouxii, that this species does not feed on them. Moreover, the 
position and smallness of the mouth shows that this animal is probably a 
ground-feeder, existing, perhaps, on the smaller hydroid Zoophytes, 
Before concluding I wish to draw once more your attention to the 
remarkable non-symmetry of the cranium of this new whale, which, probably 
more than any other known catodont cetacean, shows this so conspicuously. 
We are so accustomed to observe—almost invariably in the skeletons of the 
vertebrates—a perfect bilateral symmetry, that any deviation from this rule is 
generally regarded, if not as a monstrosity, at least as a deformity. It is, 
therefore, very striking to find in a whole and important cetacean section—the 
Denticete—the upper surface of the skull, with very few exceptions, 
unsymmetrical, amongst which the family of the Catodontide is the most 
conspicuous. This family, amongst other characteristics, is distinguished by 
the nostrils being enormously disproportionate in size, the left one being the 
largest ; at the same time the nasal bones, as those of the face, are generally 
unsymmetrical and distorted. Of them the genus Euphysetes may be said to 
possess this unsymmetrical distortion of the skull and the difference in the 
size of the nostrils in the highest degree. 
Systematic zoologists have generally hitherto had little time to do more 
than fix the so-called generic and specific characters, without being able to 
examine into the causes why certain animals exhibit such peculiar forms and 
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