276 PROFESSOR TURNER ON THE 
In all the specimens recorded by these anatomists, as well as in the one I 
am about to describe, the uterus, although with two cornua, contained only a 
single foetus ; but in a uterus, said to be that of the Phoca vitulina, described 
by A. F. J. C. Maver,* the left horn is stated to have contained five embryoes, 
and the right four, each embryo being situated in an oval sac-like dilatation of 
the uterine cornu. The placenta was .zonary, and not only the amnion, but 
the allantois and umbilical vesicle, were present. This specimen of MAyYEr’s 
differed so materially in the number of embryoes which it contained from those 
examined by all other anatomists, that I am disposed to think it could not have ~ 
been the gravid uterus of a seal, but must have been derived from some true 
carnivorous animal.t 
Seals, like other uniparous mammals, do, however, occasionally produce 
twins, and I possess twin foetuses obtained by a former pupil, Mr T. G. Kerr, 
from the uterus of a specimen of Phoca groenlandica. 
Although most important facts in the naked eye anatomy of the placenta 
of the seals have been recorded by the anatomists just referred to, yet its minute 
structure does not seem to have been investigated by any of these observers. 
This blank in its anatomical history I hope in some measure to supply in this 
communication. 
Uterus and Placenta. 
In the month of July 1872 I was invited by my friend Dr JAmMEes M‘BaIn 
to accompany him on a visit to the “ Vigilant,” the cruiser to the Board of 
Fisheries, to see two specimens of the Grey Seal, Halicherus gryphus, 
which had been shot three days previously by Captain M‘Donatp at Sule 
Skerry, off Cape Wrath. One specimen was a young male, 4 feet 7 inches 
long, the other a fine female, which measured 6 feet 11 inches from the tip of 
the nose to the tip of the tail, and 7 feet 10 mches to the end of the hind flip- 
pers. From the presence of a white glairy mucus at the orifice of the vagina, 
and from the distended condition of the abdomen, we were of opinion that the — 
animal was gravid. On opening into the abdominal cavity, the enlarged and — 
pregnant uterus was at once recognised, and through Captain M‘DonaLp’s 
kindness I was permitted to remove it and several other organs for examination. 
The uterus consisted of two horns, a body and a cervix. It was invested 
by peritoneum, which passed outwards from the horns and the side of the body 
* Analecten fiir Vergleichenden Anatomie, Zweite Sammlung, p. 55. Bonn, 1839. 
+ Sir Everarp Home (“Comparative Anatomy,” v. p. 27), refers to a placenta of a seal which 
had come under his observation, and in vol. vi. plates 26 and 63, gives some figures of the organ, The 
figures show the villous structure; but they are especially intended by the author to illustrate the 
“nerves.” Professor OwEn (‘‘ Comparative Anatomy,” iii. p. 745), says that in the seals the placenta 
is zonular in four or five continuous or connected divisions. In Phoca vitulina the diameter of the — 
placental zone, parallel with the long axis of the ovum, is between 2 and 3 inches. 

