SEALS. 483 



scriptions of tlie seals and sea-lions, that we cannot do better 

 than quote some of his remarks upon them. 



The number of species existing are not accurately known, natu- 

 ralists being divided on the subject, and such confusion reigns on 

 their classification, that, as Mr. Allen observes, one hundred and 

 three distinct specific and varietal names have been bestowed upon 

 sixteen species, leaving eighty-seven of the names as synonyms 

 — an average of about six to a species. Fourteen names appear to 

 be wholly indeterminable, while fourteen others can be referred 

 only with more or less doubt. 



The geographical distribution of the Phocidge embraces the sea- 

 shores of all parts of the temperate and colder portions of tbe 

 globe. The earless seals, however, are for the most part in- 

 habitants of the northern hemisphere, only two or three of the 

 species reaching the middle temperate latitudes. Mr. Allen writes, 

 " Of the Phocidse, one species, the Monk Seal {Monachus albiventer), 

 is found on both shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in the Adriatic 

 and Black Seas, and at the Madeira and Canary Islands, and 

 probably on the neighbouring Atlantic coast of Africa. An 

 apparently near relative and geographical representative of this 

 species is found on the shores of Yucatan, Cuba, Jamaica, the 

 Bahamas, and the Florida Keys. None of the remaining members 

 of the PhocidcB occur in the North Atlantic, except as stragglers, 

 south of the British Islands and Spain, on the European coast, or 

 of New Jersey on the American, or of Japan and Lower California 

 in the North Pacific. The species having the widest distribution 

 is the common Phoca vitulina, which occurs not only in both the 

 North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans as far southward as the 

 limits just given, but reaches Greenland, Finmark, and the 

 northern coast of Europe generally, and is also found in Behring's 

 Straits. Other species, as Erig^iathus harbaUis, Phoca foetida, 

 audi Phoca grcenlandica, extend beyond its habitat' to the north- 

 ward, but have a much more limited range to the southward, the 

 British Islands and the coast of the United States being quite 

 beyond their usual southern limit of distribution. Like Phoca 

 vitulina, these species also occur in the North Pacific. Two other 

 species are restricted to the North Atlantic, namely, Ealichcerus 



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