lili 



of such, an agile animal as the Octopus, had not nature furnished the former 

 with the means of taking good hold of it. It is interesting that the allied 

 genera Ziphius and Hyperoodon, of the Northern hemisphere, feed also on 

 similar species of cuttle-fish, as I learn from a paper of Dr. J. E. Gray, of the 

 British Museum ("Proceedings Zoological Society, 1868," p. 422). Also, the 

 Sperm Whales are said to feed almost exclusively upon the same voracious 

 animal, which, by its agility and organization, is so well adapted to make great 

 havoc amongst the smaller inhabitants of the sea. And, as Dr. Gray justly 

 observes, it proves, at the x same time, that these cephalopods, although 

 apparently of rare occurrence, must in many localities be very numerous, as it 

 would otherwise be impossible to understand how they could furnish those 

 huge whales with sufficient food. 



When I proceeded to the beach, the animal was still lying in the surf, 

 partly covered by sand, but still intact. I measured its length exactly, and 

 found it to be 30 feet 6 inches, from the tip of the nose to the end of the lobes 

 of the tail. The colour of the whole animal was of a deep velvety black, with 

 the exception of the lower portion of the belly, which had a greyish colour. 

 The tail was 6 feet 6 inches broad, and had the usual two falcate lobes. The 

 dorsal fins were situated near the neck, a little above the middle of the body, 

 and were 17 inches broad, and 19 inches long. They had a triangular form, 

 and one of them was buried in the sand when I saw the animal first. The 

 dorsal fin was unfortunately destroyed when I first inspected the whale, so 

 that I cannot describe its form and position from my own observations ; but 

 Mr. Walker told me that it was small, had the usual falcate form, and was 

 situated not far from the tail. 



I may here observe, that from the form of the skull and some other 

 characteristics, it appears evident that this whale is the Berardius Arnuxii of 

 Duvernoy, of which a specimen was caught in 1846, in Akaroa harbour, the 

 skull of which, of a length of four feet, is at present in the Imperial Museum, 

 in Paris. The animal to which it belonged is described as having been thirty- 

 two feet long, and possessing a large dorsal fin, with a large boss or hump in 

 front of it. As putrefaction and the cutting off of the blubber had greatly 

 changed the outlines of the animal, I could not observe whether it possessed the 

 larger boss in front. Mr. Walker did not speak of it when he gave me a 

 description of the animal as it appeared when captured. However, as the 

 figure of the skull, as given by Duvernoy in the "Annales des Sciences 

 Naturelles," and copied into Dr. Gray's " British Museiim Catalogue of Seals 

 and Whales," is identical with that of our own specimen, I do not hesitate to 

 state that both belong to the same species. It also seems to me that this whale 

 is very local, probably inhabiting only the coast of New Zealand, and perhaps 

 the regions south of it, because, as far as I can find, it has never been observed 

 elsewhere. It has without doubt not been met with on the coasts of Australia, 

 or it would not have passed unnoticed, as, amongst others, the energetic 

 director of the Australian Museum, Gerh. Krefft, F.L.S., has not observed it. 

 I may here state that the form of the skull is very peculiar, reminding one 

 strongly of that of a dolphin. 



There seems to be nothing known of this peculiar whale, except its 

 external appearance and its skull, and it is, therefore, a matter of congratula- 

 tion to us, that we shall be able to supply all the details of its osteological 

 characteristics, which are peculiar in many respects. 



The specimen in our possession was evidently a young animal, because all 

 the disc-like epiphyses of the vertebra? are still detached. The same is the 

 case with the epiphyses of the limb-bones, which are not yet united with them; 

 also, the sutures of the cranium are not yet obliterated. The beginning of 

 coalescence is, however, to be observed in the seven cervical vertebra?, of which 



