MAMMALOGY. 



several animals, as represented by their different authors, appear 

 in the plate that accompanies this paper in the Linnsean Amoenitates 

 Academicse. 



their natural state or have been arranged by means of scissars. Besides 

 this no mention is made of an anal fin ; nor is there any trace of it in the 

 drawing." This observation is in itself sufficiently curiously and decidedly 

 to our point. The details into which we have been induced to enter will 

 we hope resolve the doubts of the Professor and of Europe in all other par- 

 ticulars, and with the clue we now possess we shall enter once again with 

 greater certainty upon the subject of the ambiguous fin in question. 



In a figure which has been published purporting to be a representation 

 of this " Mermaid/^ from the pencil of a master of one of his Majesty's 

 ships of war, lying at the Cape of Good Hope, while this prodigy was ex- 

 hibited in the Cape town, it appears to have a minute anal fin, not 

 exceeding one-seventh part the length of the ventral fins, indeed so small 

 comparatively as to be almost inconspicuous ; and, instead of the adipose 

 or rayless fin behind, it has a fin of many rays, which from its aspect we 

 should conclude to be furnished with ramose or branching rays. In another 

 figure correspondent with this, the anal fin is again seen of the same 

 diminutive size, but this has neither an adipose, nor a radiated fin behind. 

 Let us return to the detailed description of this object; we are there 

 informed that " it has three ventral fins.'' And comparing this remark 

 with the figure in the plate that accompanies the description, we really 

 find in the place of the present single anal fin the representation of no less than 

 three distinct fins as they are described ; and there are also three fins on 

 the correspondent dorsal part, instead of the single adipose or rayless fin 

 that now appears. These series of fins occupy the whole space between 

 the vent and tail, while the tail itself instead of being formed like that of 

 the Salmon has two lobes of unequal length, the one being considerably 

 longer than the other. 



This promethean difference between the figures ofthis new found " siren'' 

 and the object as it now appears, has ledus to imagine that at the time these 

 drawings were taken, the posterior extremity of this prodigy might possibly 

 resemble that of the Shark or Squalus order, having the fins so split as to 

 give it the trilobate form which has been mistaken for three distinct fins above 

 and beneath, and also the lobate figure of the caudal extremity. We can- 

 not hesitate to deny that any such fins did ever appertain naturally to the 

 skin of the Salmo, with which the piscivorous portion of the " Mermaid " is 

 VOL. II. S 



