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Proceedings of the Pioyal Society 
diameter along the anterior border to the tip was 1 foot 8 inches, 
whilst its height was 1 1 inches. The flipper, when disarticulated 
at the shoulder, was 4 feet 10 inches in length. The breadth of the 
tail was 8. feet 8 inches : its anterior border was convex, its posterior 
border festooned. From the root of the tail to the mesial notch was 
2 feet 5 inches, and the depth of the notch was 5 inches. The lower 
jaw projected both in front of and to the sides of the upper jaw. 
The length of the animal, from the tip of the beak to the end of the 
tail, was about 37 feet, and the girth round the belly about 15 feet 
The whale was taken possession of by the Custom House officials, 
and was then sold by public auction. 
When I saw it a few days afterwards the blubber and baleen had 
been removed from the animal. The baleen consisted of numerous 
plates, the biggest of which were about 1 foot 3 inches in length and 
about 6 inches wide. They we^e black, striped with grey and white, 
and the hairs projecting from the lower free border were greyish- white. 
The fluted state of the belly and the presence of a dorsal fin 
proved it to be one of the Balsenopteridse, or Tinner whales. It was 
evident, both from the colour of the whalebone and the shape of 
the upper jaw, the lateral borders of which were straight, that the 
animal was not the Balcenoptera sibbaldii , a magnificent example of 
which had been stranded at Longniddry only three years before.* 
Its size and the colour of its baleen distinguished it also from the 
lesser piked whale, Baloewojyiera rostrcda . The absence of yellowish 
and greenish tints in the plates of the whalebone threw some doubt 
on its being Balcenoptera musculus , but I was not in a position, in 
the condition the animal then was, to discriminate between Baloe- 
noptera musculus and B. borealis . I decided, therefore, to buy the 
carcass, and to have the skeleton prepared for the Anatomical 
Museum of the University. Accordingly men were engaged to 
take the flesh off the hones, and to separate it into pieces of con- 
venient size for transport into Edinburgh. I regret to say that the 
sternum and pelvic bones were lost amidst the masses of flesh, and 
could not be recovered ; but with these exceptions, and that of 
a carpal hone, some of the smallest phalanges, and perhaps one or 
two chevrons, the skeleton is, I believe, perfect. As the bones of 
the large cetacea are, from the quantity of oil which they contain, 
* See my account of this animal in Tracis. Roy. Soc. Edin., 1870, vol. xxvi. 
