444 
Proceedings of the Royal Society 
and figured* a female cetacean, Mesojplodon bidens, which he identifies 
with Sowerby’s whale. It was captured on the 3rd February 1880, 
at Hevringholm Strand, on the east coast of Jutland. As natural- 
ists have possessed so few opportunities of seeing this animal, 
I append an abstract of Professor Reinhardt’s account of this 
specimen : — 
“It was 13 feet 9 inches (Danish) long, and nearly full grown. Except 
in a few places, nearly all the cuticle was removed, for the animal had 
been dead for over a month. The remains of the epidermis and the 
interior of the mouth were blackish. The body in front of the dorsal 
fin was rounded transversely, but a little behind the head it was com- 
pressed laterally, and towards the dorsal mesial line. Behind the dorsal 
fin the body was compressed into a sharp dorsal keel, which faded away 
on the upper surface of the tail. A sharp keel did not exist on the under 
surface, though it was also somewhat compressed. The tail did not have 
a mesial notch between its lateral lobes. The anteriorly converging 
furrows in the throat ran together in this animal similarly to what was 
described by Mr. W. Andrews in an Irish specimen. The external auditory 
meatus was large and conspicuous, its size perhaps depending on the 
circumstance that the epidermis was removed. The external nares were 
semilunar and not mesial, but more to the left, so that scarcely a third 
was on the right side of the mesial line. Moreover, it cut the middle 
line a little obliquely, so that the end of the right cornu reached a little 
more forwards than the left, and the want of symmetry showed itself also 
in the left side of the crescent, being somewhat more curved than the 
right. The contour of the head, when looked at from above, showed a 
greater convexity to the outer side of the spiracle on the left side than 
on the right. As is well known, the mandible of this whale possesses a 
pair of compressed teeth, large in the male, smaller in the female. On 
first seeing this specimen no teeth were recognised, for the mandibular 
teeth were covered and concealed by the skin. But some days later 
when the integument was more shrunk, two small functionless teeth, of 
about the size of a pin’s head, were also seen on each side of the upper jaw 
about to emerge from the skin, in which they were so loosely lodged that 
they were freely movable. The more anterior tooth was 9" 3"' from the 
tip of the superior maxilla, the second 5'" behind the first, and at a 
similar distance behind the second a third could be felt on cutting into 
the skin, and, more posteriorly, apparently a fourth. No small function- 
less teeth were seen in the mandible, though they were also probably 
In a letter which he has favoured me with, in reply to a query for further 
information, he states that, having bought the skeleton, he found it to be a 
Ilyperoodon. 
* Oversight over d. K. P. Vidcnsh. Selsle., Forhldl. 1880. 
