717 
1908-9.] The Skeleton of a Sowerby’s Whale. 
Examples of fusion in the same row are not uncommon in the cetacean 
carpus, and their articulation with the metacarpals should be carefully 
noted in determining which of the bones are fused together. Of the 
species described in this communication there can be no doubt that the 
rule in Mesoplodon bidens is for C 2 to fuse with C 3 , and to articulate with 
M n and M nI ; usually also C 4 fuses with C 5 and articulates with M IV and 
M v . The fusion of C 2 and C 3 constitutes the zipliius type of carpus 
of Klikenthal. In the Dalgety Bay Mesoplodon the small size of the most 
ulnar disto-carpal led me to think that it represented only C 4 for articula- 
tion with M IV ; whilst M v was displaced from the proper distal border of 
C 4 , and articulated with the ulnare ; C 5 was, on this view, possibly absent. 
In Lagenorynchus cdbirostris C 2 and C 3 were fused, and the conjoined 
bone articulated with M n and M IrI ; C 4 was small, articulated with M IV and 
not with M v ; C l and C 5 were absent as separate bones or were perhaps 
combined with others. 
In Grampus griseus C 3 and C 4 were fused and articulated with M IIX 
and M IV , whilst C 2 remained as a separate bone for M n , and articulated 
with the pollex. 
In Delphinus acutus and Monodon monoceros C 2 and C 3 were fused 
and articulated with M n and M IIX ; C 4 was present, and articulated princi- 
pally with M IV ; C l was also present, but C 5 did not exist as a separate 
bone. Phocoena communis had only two disto-carpals, being the minimum 
number found in the Odontoceti ; of these one apparently represented C 2 
fused with C 3 , whilst the other was C 4 ; C T and C 5 were not visible as 
independent units. 
As a distinct example of fusion of a distal with a proximal carpal I 
may refer to fig. 8, the left carpus of Globicephalus melas , in which C 3 had 
fused with the ulnare. The question of fusion between bones of the distal 
and proximal rows, or of the distal with the metacarpals, arises also in con- 
nection with the condition of C a and C 5 of the distal carpalia, which 
bones may in several species be absent as independent units ; the possibility 
of fusion either with a bone of the proximal row or with a metacarpal has 
to be considered. C 5 is the element which most frequently has no separate 
representative, and which cannot definitely be regarded as fused with 
C 4 . In Belpliinus delphis and acutus , Grampus griseus , Lagenorynchus 
cdbirostris, Globicephalus melas, Phocoena communis, Delphinapterus 
leucas (Beluga), Monodon monoceros, M v articulated directly with the 
ulnare without the interposition of a separate disto-carpale. Klikenthal 
regarded this as the Beluga type of carpus common in the Odontoceti. It 
might arise from fusion of the cartilaginous C 5 with the ulnare, or from 
