Manatid/e.- 
-MAMMALIA.- 
-Marsupialia. 
207 
suit of living animals. In these the snout is conical 
and peculiarly elongated, and in some, as in Delphinus 
Gangeticus, the jaws are produced to an extreme 
length, so as to give them every advantage in seizing 
their swift and slippery prey ; whilst in the herbivorous 
Dugong the snout is as remarkable for its obtuse, trun- 
cate character — a form, however, which is equally 
advantageous to it, and well adapted to its habits of 
browsing upon the algae and fuci which grow upon the 
submarine rocks of the Indian seas. As, from the fixed 
nature of the Dugong’s food, the motions of the animal 
during the time of feeding must relate more Immediately 
to the necessity of coming to the surface to respire ; 
its tail, the principal organ of locomotive ascent and 
descent, is proportionally greater than in the true 
Cetacea, its breadth being rather more than one-third 
the length of the whole bodjn” The Dugong enjoys a 
pretty wide geographical distribution, being found not 
only in the Indian seas generally, but also in the Bed 
Sea; formerly large numbers inhabited the shores of 
the Isle of France. According to Sir Stamford Raffles, 
and others, tliey usually feed at two, three, or four 
fathoms’ depth of water. They are abimdant oft the 
Malayan coast, and especially at the mouth of the 
Johore river. The native Malays spear them at night- 
time ; their presence being indicated by a snuffing noise. 
When caught, the tail is raised up out of the water, as 
the animal is quite powerless in this position. The 
habits of the Dugong are gregarious, herding, sa 3 's 
Leguat, to the extent of three or four hundred indi- 
viduals at a single spot. Like other cetaceans, they 
display extraordinary attachment to their young, de- 
fending them to the death ; on being taken the suckers 
utter a short and sharp cry. All accounts agree in 
considering the flesh to be delicate and pleasant eating. 
One or two other Dugongs have been described. 
Ruppell considers the form inhabiting the Red Sea as a 
separate species ; and this opinion is shared by several 
naturalists. It was called by him Halicore Taberna- 
culi, from a notion that the skin was employed by 
the Jews in veiling the tabernacle. The Australian 
Dugong [H. australis) is generally admitted to be 
distinct. 
STELLER’S RHYTINA {Rhytina Stelleri)—?\&tQ 26, 
fig. 86 — is one of those interesting mammalian forms 
whose extinction is only of very recent date, yet so com- 
plete as to have left scarce a wreck behind. Discovered 
in 1741, after a few short years it entu'ely succumbed to 
the rapacity of our greedy race, who, without even 
aftbrding naturalists a fair opportunity of unravelling its 
curious structure, have swept it from its native shores, 
and well-nigh obliterated all trace of its existence. It 
is well for science, that Steller, whose worthy name 
it bears, was among the number of those unfortunate 
voyagers who were wrecked on the inhospitable shores 
of the dreary island where this animal was first dis- 
covered ; and it is still more fortunate that he left an 
authentic record of his discovery, which was published 
subsequent to his death by the Academy of St. Peters- 
burg in 1749, and afterwards at Halle in 175.8, in a 
separate treatise entitled “ Ausfiihrliche Beschreibung 
von sonderbaren Meerthieren.” At the time of its 
discovery on Behring’s Island, it does not appear to 
have been particularly abundant, and since the year 
1768 no trace of its presence in a living state has ever 
been i-ecorded. There can be no doubt; however, that 
considerable numbers previously existed, and these, it 
appears, have all fallen a prey to the Aleutian sea- 
otter hunters, whose exploits have been so graphically 
described by the Russian explorer Von Kotzebue, and 
others. Steller’s Rhytina attained a length of upwards 
of twenty-four feet, its greatest circumferential girth 
being about twenty feet. According to Steller the 
pectoral flippers contained no digits, which, if correct, 
is very remarkable ; and what is equally singular, there 
were no teeth either above or below, their absence 
being amply compensated by the presence of hard 
undulating lamellse — partly made up of horny tubes and 
partly calcareous — which covered the jaws internally, 
and performed all the necessary functions of bruising, 
masticating, and detaching the sea-weeds, on which 
these animals lived. Another peculiarity is mentioned 
as aftecting the skin ; the epidermis being fully an inch 
in thickness, and composed of thick cylindrical fibres, 
which were curiously folded or fissured, so as to present 
a verj’' rugged uneven surface ; the true dermis remain- 
ing comparatively thin. The surface of the bide ex- 
hibited a deep brown or purplish-black tint. The head 
was small when compared with the bulk of the body ; 
the tail, on the contrary, extensively developed and 
of an oval figure. The stomach is described by 
Steller as small. In the catalogue of Cetacea, preserved 
in the British Museum, this species is alluded to under 
the title of the Morskaia Korova or Rhytina gigas. It 
has also been described under the generic appellations 
of Stellerus, Mauatus, and even Trichechus. 
Order XIII.— MARSUPIALIA. 
As indicated in the general introduction to the class 
Mammalia, the present order exhibits several characters 
wdely differing from those displayed by any of the 
foregoing, the distinctive features having especial refer- 
ence to the parts concerned in the reproduction and 
the rearing of their young. It is almost superfluous, 
therefore, to recapitulate the facts — succinctly stated at 
page 8 — which have led naturalists to acquiesce in the 
arrangement of Cuvier, who first grouped the marsupials 
together under the ordinal title above retained ; never 
theless it may be well to observe, in brief, that the 
external and internal characters by which these ani- 
mals are at once recognized depend upon the presence 
of abdominal pouches or foldings of the skin, which are 
inverted in the females for the purpose of concealing, 
protecting, and nourishing the young, and everted in 
the males for the lodgment of the reproductive glands. 
The young are born in an imperfectly developed 
