792 
Proceedings of Boyal Society of Edinburgh . [sess. 
On the Stomach of the Narwhal (Monodon monoceros). By 
G. Sims Woodhead, M.D., and Robert W. Gray, Student 
of Anatomy , the University , Edinburgh. (With Four Plates.) 
(Read March 18, 1889.) 
Although numerous most admirable descriptions of the stomach 
of various species of Delphinidse (the family of toothed Whales to 
which the Narwhal belongs) have from time to time appeared from 
the pens of most able observers (of whom a list will he found in 
the references appended), we have found it impossible to find any- 
thing more than a mere indication of the histological structure of 
the various portions of the walls of the peculiar digestive apparatus 
of these animals.* As one of us had an opportunity of obtaining 
material in a comparatively fresh condition, we decided to make 
arrangements for preserving it properly, so that it might be sub- 
jected to microscopic examination on being brought to this country.! 
With all the care that was taken some portions of the mucous 
membrane have suffered slightly, but in all cases the changes are 
so slight that we are enabled to speak positively on the points to 
which reference is made. 
In the Narwhal, as in other cetaceans, the stomach is of a com- 
plex nature, and has been compared by some observers to that of 
the ruminants. In the present state of our knowledge, however, 
it is difficult to give any definite opinion on the morphological 
affinities and relations of the viscus, though it certainly approaches 
the carnivorous type much more nearly than that of the herbivorous 
ruminants. The subject is one in which great difficulties are in- 
volved, and although we think that, eventually, the histological 
structure which we now give may throw some light on the matter, - 
we are not prepared to say in what group of animals the nearest 
morphological structure is found. We now propose to describe in 
* Since this was read, we have seen Professor Max Weber’s admirable paper, 
in which a description of the histological structure of the stomach is given, 
Morph. Jahr., 1887-1888, p. 637 et seq,; and Sir Wm. Turner’s paper on 
“Additional Observations on the Stomach in the Ziphioid and Delphinoid 
Whales,” Jour. Anat. and Phys., vol. xxiii. p. 466 et seq. 
f The stomach obtained was that of an adult female, 14 feet in length, 
killed in the Greenland Sea during the summer of 1888. 
