On two subfossil Whales discovered in Sweden. 



37 



The entire number of the bone-fragments discovered amounts to 51. 

 Of these 12, including the vertebra in the possession of the Royal Academy 

 of Sciences, are vertebrae apparently all belonging- to the caudal region, not 

 consecutive, but with several gaps between them 1 ); 16 vertebral epiphyses, 

 that have been attached to the ends of these vertebrae , of which epiphyses 

 however two do not belong to the caudal region, but seem to have been 

 attached to the lumbosacral vertebrae; the breast-bone, one bladebone, and 

 22 fragments of ribs. No rib is unbroken, and of the bits it has been 

 possible to put together only three ribs, one of which is somewhat injured 

 at the lower end. Moreover 4 bits combine two and two into two fragments 

 of ribs. The remainder are separate fragments which cannot be put toge- 

 ther. The loose vertebral epiphyses, the very porous ends of the ribs, the 

 thick and very porous upper edge of the bladebone, the blunt and porous 

 extremities of the vertebral processes, and the comparatively small size of 

 the bones, all show that these bones belonged to a very young subject. 

 Nevertheless the arcus of the vertebrae is fully developed, and, as well as 

 the processes, firmly attached. The bones are not petrified, but still gene- 

 rally very hard, and some of them pretty heavy, considerably heavier than 

 they would have been, especially since they are young and very spongy, 

 if they had not so long lain in moist earth. On the vertebra, presented by 

 Gyllenhal to the Royal Academy of Science, a little of the soil in which 

 it lay remains still attached, evidently showing that that soil was clay. 



The first of the discovered vertebrae (PL IX. figg. 78 — 81) seems to have 

 been either the 1 th or 2 nd caudal vertebra. There are marks of the articu- 

 lar surfaces for the processus spinosus inferior both in front and behind, so 

 that the vertebra is more probably the 2 nd . It has the lateral processes much 

 broader than on the next of those that have been found (figg. 82, 83), which 

 we take to have been separated from the other by one lost vertebra. Both 

 the processus spinosus and the processus mammillares are alike in both, 

 but' the foramen spinale is larger in the former. The lateral processes are 

 pretty much bent downwards, broader toward the end, and with a conca- 

 vity on the anterior edge at the base , for the ascending branch of the aorta. 

 The corpus has on the under side no longitudinal channel, but is on the 

 contrary transversally holloved both here and on the sides under the lateral 

 processes. Dimensions of this vertebra: Breadth of corpus in front 7y"; 



') A renewed examination of these vertebrae has caused to make certain mo- 

 difications in the explanation of them given in our Treatise on the Scandinavian 

 Cetacea. 



