4. AECTOCEPHALTTS. 21 



Capt. Abbott's young specimen in the British Museum chiefly 

 differs from the adult specimen in the same collection in the hairs 

 being longer, more erect, and with minute white tips, and in the 

 face, throat, and chest being rufous brown ; but this reddish colour 

 is common to the young of several Sea-bears. 



The skulls from Desolation Island, on the south-west coast of 

 Patagonia, presented to the Anatomical Museum of the University 

 of Edinburgh by the late Professor Gbodsir, evidently belong to 

 Euotaria nigrescens, the usual Fur-Seal of the Falkland Islands and 

 other pai-ts of the coast of South-west America. Two of the 

 skulls are from adult animals, are without the lower jaws, and 

 have only a few worn and broken teeth, having been rolled on the 

 beach. 



The other skull is pf a young animal, exactly similar to the skull 

 of a young Euotaria nigrescens, n. 1013 «, in the British-Museum 

 collection. The front edge of the hinder nostrils is as arched as in 

 that specimen ; the teeth are rather more developed than in our 

 skuU ; they have a weU-marked central lobe and a distinct small 

 acute tubercle on the front edge of the cingulum. 



The two adult skulls axe very like the adult skull of E. nigrescens, 

 1013 c^, in the British Museum; but the opening of the internal 

 nostrils is narrower, and their front edge in one is not nearly so 

 angular, and in the other it is rather more arched than in either 

 of the other two skuUs, showing that the size of the posterior 

 nasal aperture and the form of its front edge vary in different 

 specimens of this species. 



The comparison of the young skull with the more adult one 

 shows that the grinders change their position considerably as re- 

 gards the front edge of the hinder nasal opening. In the young 

 skull of Euotaria nigrescens the hinder end of the tooth-line is very 

 near (not a quarter of an inch from) a line level with the front 

 edge of the internal nasal opening, and the hinder part of the pa- 

 late in front of the aperture is nearly as broad as the middle of the 

 palate : in the adult skull the hinder end of the tooth-line is a fuU 

 inch from the front edge of the internal nasal opening, the hinder 

 part of the palate is contracted toward the internal nostril, and the 

 internal nasal opening is lengthened and narrowed ; but the real 

 position of the teeth, as compared with the front part of the zygo- 

 matic arch, is little altered, though the form of the palate gives 

 them the appearance of being more changed than they really are. 



These skulls are interesting as showing that Euotaria nigrescens, 

 like Otaria leonina and Morunga elephantina, is, or was, common 

 to the Falkland Islands and- the west coast of South America. 



The chief character by which the adult skull of Euotaria nigres- 

 cens can be distinguished from the adult skuU of Arctocephalus 

 antarcticus is, that the hinder or fifth upper grinder and the pen- 

 ultimate or fourth are placed rather in front of the hinder edge of 

 the front part of the zygomatic arch ; but the position of the teeth is 

 most distinctive in the skull of the young animal, and loses much ■ 

 of its importance in comparing old skulls together, unless the skulk 



