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APPENDICES.
Africa as recommended as favourable place for further study. Cape Tropez (? Lopez) in the French Congo, also recommended for collecting."
The last entry in Major Barrett-Hamilton's pocket-book shows that at the time of his death he was still of opinion that the investigations should be extended to the African coast; the entry is as follows:-" 16th January, 1914, Captain Begg to write about whales in Falklands and South Shetlands. Ask him for African introductions."
It is further desirable that investigations should be made as to the earlier stages of embryonic development in the larger Cetacea. The South African coast might afford material suitable for this research.
Further information from Newfoundland and any that can be collected from the eastern coast of South America will be of great value.
It is much to be hoped that careful investigations will continue to be made on the west coast of Ireland, and that someone will be sent to the Hebrides to examine the whales caught there. The British Museum badly needs osteological material from all the localities mentioned.
If such investigations are made our knowledge of the whales and of their breeding habits and migrations will greatly increase; it should then be possible to put the whaling industry on a scientific and business-like basis.
On its present scale, and with its present wasteful and indiscriminate methods, whaling is an industry which, by destroying its own resources, must soon expire.
21st March, 1915.
APPENDIX I.
MARTIN A. C. HINTON.
NOTES ON FŒtal Finners and their MEMBRANES.
MAJOR BARRETT-HAMILTON has left the following notes relating to the fœtuses of finners and the fœtal membranes which he examined at South Georgia :
(1) Male fœtus, 4 ft, 6§ in. long, obtained from finner No. 15.
Dimensions:-
Notch of flukes to centre of anus, 17 in. Notch of flukes to penis, 21 in. (21-75 in.).
Notch of flukes to dorsal fin, 20-5 in.
Notch of flukes to navel, 22 in.
Notch of flukes to tip of pectoral, 32 in.
Notch of flukes to insertion of pectoral, 37 in. (39 in.).
Notch of flukes to eye, 45 in. (46 in.).
Notch of flukes to ear, 42 in.
Length of penis, 1-5 in.
Length of blowhole, 1.25 in.
Extreme width of flukes, 11 in.
Ear present but closed. Eye formed.
Dorsal falcate. No baleen. Pleats
only slightly formed. Organ of Jacobson present. No ruga on palate. Hairs about thirty on tip of mandible arranged in two rows, with an inferior cluster as in the dam (sketch); seven on papillæ in a horizontal row on each mandible centrally and externally. No trace of dorsal hairs.
Colour-after exposure to the air-deep pinkish, except on lower jaw and top of head to pectoral, where dusky. Back slightly dusky; but on turning up the lower side, which had been protected from the sun, it was found that exposure to the air had greatly altered the upper side.
Pleats, about sixty. Diaphragm diagonal, to give room for lungs (sketch).
A note headed "Special Investigation of Genital Organs," No. 15, has already been dealt with in part at p. 113, above. It is illustrated by a sketch, which shows the fœtus lying in the body of the uterus, the tail of the foetus being turned towards the vagina. The foetus is described as "lying in a bright yellow fluid inside a bag with thin walls, white interiorly, red and vascular exteriorly (A in sketch). This thin bag separated from thick, very vascular wall of uterus (B) by a dirty brown watery fluid. P, horn of uterus, of similar structure to the above [that is to say. as shown by the sketch, that it contained a similar bag filled with yellow fluid and separated from the uterine wall by a brown fluid], but not containing a foetus and quite separated from the rest of the uterus; attached, but with no perceptible duct, is a small ovary.
APPENDICEA.
179
"Q, the other horn, is much larger and communicates freely with the part hold- ing the fœtus. Its ovary had a deeply-coloured, swollen mass, evidently corres- ponding to an 'ovarian scar.' Both ovaries are diffused and not of one piece each." The statement as to the free communication of this horn with the part containing the foetus means, as shown by the sketch, that the sac containing the foetus and the A bright yellow fluid in which the latter floated extended throughout this cornu. small sketch on this sheet shows the foetus attached by two diverging ends of the umbilical cord to the wall of the "thin inner bag."
"Further dissection showed that the bag or membrane marked A-A in my diagram admitted of division into two parts, viz., (1) an internal, transparent mem- brane, supplied with a few blood vessels, connected with the embryo by the umbilical cord and evidently the amnion. It was covered with curious yellow papilla, as was also the umbilical cord; these seemned to have something to do with the yellow fluid in which the embryo was bathed (? amniotic corpuscles). (2) An external, deep red, highly vascular membrane, about twice as thick as the amnion, and closely applied to it. These two membranes together formed a bag, which appeared to have no attachments, and which, on being pulled, came away free at once. I was puzzled and tried to divide it into allantois and chorion, but I was doubtfully able to do this. I also was able to pull away the bag from the unused cornu P, and this now seemed to have a connexion with A-A, but certainly not at Z [i.e., at mouth of cornu), where, as shown in the diagram, there was no passage. I do not understand the fœtus floating freely between two fluids, but it is possible that the shock caused by the death of the mother caused separation of the placenta from the uterine walls; either that or the chorion was left attached to the uterine walls. The dissection will evidently have to be done again.
"Inside the bag were one or two strange fatty bodies, resembling pats of butter. The inner surface of the uterus ( chorion) was traversed by sinuous, out- standing red lines (? villi).
I was not able to make out clearly the serous, muscular, and mucous coats of the uterus, but the median portion was well supplied with large blood vessels.
“The umbilical cord contained four vessels-two arteries, two veins, and a tube (? urachus) leading direct to the bag, and dividing to go in opposite directions before reaching the amnion" (illustrated by sketch).
(2) Female fœtus, 5 ft. 7 in. long, in No. 33.
Greatest length, 5 ft. 7 in.
Notch of flukes to anus, 20-5 in. Notch of flukes to vagina, 22 in.
Notch of flukes to umbilical cord, 31-5 in. Notch of flukes to dorsal fin, 18 in.
Tip of snout to eye, 11.5 in. Tip of snout to blowhole, 9 in. Tip of snout to pectoral, 21 in. Tip of mandible to gape, 14 in. Flukes, breadth of, 14-5 in. Pectoral, 9 in. by 22 in. Girth at caudal peduncle, 8:5 in Girth at genital, 1 ft. 7 in. Girth at umbilical, 2 ft. 5 in. Girth at pectoral, 2 ft. 9 in. Girth at eye, 2 ft. 7in.
The note (and sketch) relating to the genitals of No. 33 has already been partly dealt with above at p. 114: the remainder of it reads thus :-"With the foetus came a free placenta of 25 ft., without apparent attachment to the mother, but including three membranes as in first dissection (No. 15). Dr. Janke finds this always the case, and I think the shock of the dam's death detaches the embryo with its three membranes. Inside of uterus richly vascular and raised in longitudinal ridges (villi). The foetusless cornu had less development in this way than the cornu belonging to the foetus. Otherwise everything as in first dissection."
(3) Male fœtus, 6 ft. 8 in. long, found in No. 39.
Girth at axilla, 38 in.
Girth at navel, 35 in.
Girth at penis, 27-25 in.
Girth at anus, 21-5 in.
Girth at base of caudal peduncle, 99 in. Without baleen and with flat palate.