568 CONCLUSIONS. 
consequently those individuals which had a longer neck than the 
others survived their less privileged congeners, so that at last a 
group arose with a very long neck and a comparatively small head. 
It seems that the external ears disappeared. They never came aland 
or on ice-floes. They even abandoned the cold regions and currents 
of the ocean, better liking the warmer parts. Their ordinary mode 
of swimming is with vertical undulations. Seldom do they swim 
with the body in a straight line, by means of their flappers. This 
little division for which I propose the name of Longicaudata, or 
Long-tailed Animals, consists only of one genus: Megophas Rar., 
including only one species Megophias megophias (Ra¥.) Ovp., the 
sea-serpent. 
I purposely have not mentioned the genera Sgualodon and Stenodon, 
and the group of Plagiuwri (Art., 1735; Physeteres, Kuen, 1741; 
Cetacea, Briss, 1756; Cete, Linn, 1758), as the recent cetologists 
still differ m opinions as to their relation to Baszlosaurus and the 
Pinnipedia. 
I think the following phylogenetic table will in a more practical 
manner show the “one which in my opinion sea- serpents occupy 
in the System of Nature. 
To many of my readers the above sketch of the rank of the 
sea-serpent in the System of Nature will no doubt seem to be too 
bold. They will say that the affinity of the sea-serpent to sea-lions 
and sea-bears (to the <uriculata) is expressed here too dicisively, 
that, scientifically spoken, the sea-serpent is not yet known, that 
at best its existence is only beyond a doubt, and that when a 
specimen fell into the hands of men, it might be shown that the 
close affinity to the Awuriculata was only apparent, and that in 
reality the relation is more remote. I confess that there is much 
to say in favour of this reasoning, but a¢ all events the sea-serpent 
as a true Pinniped. \t has four flappers, a hairy skin, and strong 
whiskers. Its head resembles that of a sea-lion, its long neck re- 
sembles that of a sea-lion, its trunk and its foreflappers resemble 
those of a sea-lion. But these resemblances may be explained as 
resulting from convergency. When viewed in this way it seems to 
be more careful to consider the origin of the sea-serpent in the 
following manner. 
The ancestors of Pinnipedia and Basilosaurus, which I have 
