TRANSACTIONS 
OF THE 
NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE 
1884 
I.—ZOOLOGY. 
Art. I.—Notes on the Skeleton and Baleen of a Fin-whale (Balenoptera 
musculus?) recently acquired by the Otago University Museum. By Jà 
Jerrery Parker, B.Sc. Lond., Professor of Biology in the University 
of Otago. 
[Read before the Otago Institute, 14th October, 1884.] 
Ratner more than a year ago, a large whale's skeleton was exhibited in 
many parts of the colony by Captain Jackson Barry, who finally brought it 
to Dunedin. On visiting the shed where the bones were roughly set up, 
I found the animal to be a Balenoptera, a genus hitherto not represented in 
this Museum ; and, as the number of bones missing was comparatively 
small, and the baleen was perfect, I entered into negotiations with Mr. 
Barry, with the ultimate result of securing the specimen as soon as it 
had ceased to ** draw " as a show. 
In one of his valuable contributions to our knowledge of the Cetacea,* 
Professor Flower remarks: ** We am at present so little definite informa- 
tion upon the specific cl t hical distribution of the Cetacea, 
that it is desirable that no ogoorun chal be lost of putting on record 
any facts which may contribute to the better knowledge of the natural history 
of even the most common species of this interesting group of Mammalia.” 
I have, therefore, thought it advisable to communicate to the Institute a 
few notes on the specimen in question, with a view of furnishing a series of 
measurements for comparison with those already on record, and of calling 
attention to one or two points in which the specimen differs from hitherto 
described examples. It also seems desirable that an accurate account of the 
skeleton as it reached the Museum should be placed on record, so that 
any one interested in the matter may have no difficulty in finding out at 
once how far the specimen, as mounted, is ‘‘ restored.” 
* «On a Lesser Fin-whale recently stranded on the Norfolk Coast.” Proc. Zool. 
Soc., 1864, p. 252, 
