564 CONCLUSIONS. 
from the Museum of Zoology in University College, Dundee, 
Vol. I, N°. 9, 1890) rejects any affinity of this group to Whales. 
I should like to go still farther and pretend that it has just as 
much claim to the title of Pinnipeds, as seals, sea-elephants, sea- 
bears, sea-lions, and sea-serpents. The skull was somewhat leng- 
thened in front; the brain-case diminished in size; the deciduous 
dentition probably cut the gum; the permanent dentition was the 
typical heterodont carnivorous one (i $, c +, m 4); the nostrils 
were placed on the tip of the nose, as in seals, but directed up- 
wards; the fore-limbs were perfectly those of seals, and provided 
with nails; but the rest of the body must have reseméled that of 
a slender and elongated dolphin, or whale, with an enormous 
pointed tail. The most successful manner of swimming for these 
animals was by means of vertical undulations, which, as the fore-— 
part of the body (head and trunk) was somewhat bulky, and 
therefore somewhat inflexible, were strongest in the tail-part of 
the animal; consequently the hind-legs, used less and less, disap- 
peared, if not quite, at least for the greater part. The animals 
were still hairy, though the hairs were most probably thinly scat- 
tered; the whiskers remained on the lips. The head was relatively 
large, not with regard to the animal’s total length, but to the 
trunk, and therefore the neck was very short. Externally the neck 
must not have been plainly visible. The animals could not move 
the head as easily as seals and sea-lions do, and therefore it was 
of great advantage that the nostrils were directed upwards. The 
vertebrae have the type of those of the Pinnipeds. — Such animals 
are now extinct, but their fossil remains are found and called 
Basilosaurus by Hartan in 1824 (afterwards Owrn gave them the 
name of Zeuglodon, 1839). 
B.— This second group is called Pinanipedia by ItuieER in 1811, 
and ALLEN gives of it the following characters: 
“[imbs pinniform, or modified into swimming organs, and en- 
closed to or beyond the elbows and knees within the common 
integument. Digits of the manus decreasing in length and size 
from the first to the fifth; of those of the pes, the first and fifth 
largest and longest, the three middle ones shorter and subequal. 
Pelvis with the iliac portion very short, and the anterior border — 
much everted; ischia barely meeting by a short symphysis (never — 
anchylosed) and in the female usually widely separated. Skull gen- 
erally greatly compressed interorbitally ; facial portion usually short, 
rather broad, and the brain-case abruptly expanded. Lachrymal — 
