Gulo.[514]—Dentition: i ³⁄₃, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁄₂; total 38. Crowns of the teeth very stout. Upper molar very much smaller than the carnassial. Lower carnassial large, with very small talon and no inner cusp. Third upper incisor unusually large, almost like a canine. The dentition, though really but a modification of that of the Weasels, presents a great general resemblance to that of the Hyæna. Palate prolonged somewhat behind the last molar. Humerus with an entepicondylar foramen. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 3, C 15. Body and limbs stoutly made. Feet large and powerful, subplantigrade, with large, compressed, much curved, and sharp-pointed claws. Soles of the feet (except the pads of the toes) covered with thick bristly hairs. Ears very small, nearly concealed by the fur. Eyes small. Tail short, thick, and bushy. Fur full, long, and rather coarse. The one species, the Wolverene or Glutton (G. luscus, Fig. 270), an inhabitant of the forest regions of Northern Europe, Asia, and America, much resembles a small Bear in appearance. It is a very powerful animal for its size, climbs trees, and lives on grouse, squirrels, hares, foxes, beavers, reindeer, and is said to attack even horses and cows. The Wolverene has a curious habit of stealing and secreting articles of which it can make no possible use, as is exemplified in the following instance related by Dr. Coues: “A hunter and his family, having left their lodge unguarded during their absence, on their return found it completely gutted—the walls were there, but nothing else. Blankets, guns, kettles, axes, cans, knives, and all the other paraphernalia of a trapper’s tent had vanished, and the tracks left by the beast showed who had been the thief. The family set to work, and, by carefully following up all his paths, recovered, with some trifling exceptions, the whole of the lost property.” The pairing season occurs in March, and the female, secure in her burrow, produces her young, four or five at a birth, in June or July. In defence of these she is exceedingly bold, and the Indians, according to Coues, “have been heard to say that they would sooner encounter a she-bear with her cubs than a carcajou (the Indian name of the glutton) under the same circumstances.”

Fossil remains of the Wolverene are found in cavern and other Pleistocene deposits in various parts of Europe.

Suborder Pinnipedia.

The Eared-Seals, Walruses, and Seals differ from the rest of the Carnivora mainly in the structure of their limbs, which are modified for aquatic progression,—the two proximal segments being very short and partially enveloped in the general integument of the body; while the third segment, especially in the hinder extremities, is elongated, expanded, and webbed. There are always five well-developed digits on each limb. In the hind limb the two marginal digits (first and fifth) are stouter and generally longer than the others. The teeth also differ from those of the more typical Carnivora. The incisors are always fewer than ³⁄₃. The cheek series consists generally of four premolars and one molar of very uniform characters, with never more than two roots, and with conical, more or less compressed, pointed crowns, which may have accessory cusps, placed before or behind the principal one, but are never broad and tuberculated; and there is no differentiated carnassial tooth. The milk-teeth are very small and simple, and are shed or absorbed at a very early age, usually either before or within a few days after birth. The brain is relatively large; the cerebral hemispheres being broad in proportion to their length, with numerous and complex convolutions. There is a very short cæcum. The kidneys are divided into numerous distinct lobules. There are no Cowper’s glands. The mammæ are either two or four, and abdominal in position. No clavicles. Tail always very short. Eyes very large and exposed, with flat cornea.

The animals of this group are all aquatic in their mode of life, spending the greater part of their time in the water, swimming and diving with great facility, feeding mainly on fish, crustaceans, and other marine animals, and progressing on land with difficulty. They always come on shore, however, for the purpose of bringing forth their young. They are generally marine, but they occasionally ascend large rivers, and some inhabit inland seas and lakes, as the Caspian and Baikal. Though not numerous in species, they are widely distributed over the world, but occur most abundantly on the coasts of lands situated in cold and temperate zones. The suborder is divisible into three well-marked families: the Otariidæ, Fur-Seals or Sea-Bears, which form a transition from the Fissiped Carnivora to the Seals; the Trichechidæ, containing the Walrus; and the Phocidæ or typical Seals.

The resemblances between the skull and other parts of the body of the Fur Seals and the Ursoid true Carnivora is suggestive of some genetic relationship between the two groups, and Professor Mivart[515] expresses the opinion that the one group is the direct descendant of the other. The same writer goes on to suggest that if the Eared-Seals have been derived from Bear-like Carnivores this need not necessarily hold good with the true Seals, which may have had another, and possibly Lutrine, origin. The presence of an alisphenoid canal in Ursus and the Otariidæ, and its absence in Lutra and the Phocidæ, together with other osteological features, are cited in support of this view; but although these resemblances and differences are certainly remarkable, yet much more evidence is required before the hypothesis can be accepted as even a probable one. It must, moreover, be borne in mind that the true Bears are a very modern group; and there is a possibility that the Pinnipeds may prove to have been independently derived from the extinct Carnivora noticed below under the name of Creodonta.

Family Otariidæ.

When on land the hind feet are turned forwards under the body, and aid in supporting and moving the trunk as in ordinary mammals. A small external ear. Testes suspended in a distinct external scrotum. Skull with postorbital processes, and an alisphenoid canal. Angle of mandible inflected. Palms and soles of feet naked.

Otaria.[516]—Dentition: i ³⁄₂, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁻²⁄₁; total 34 or 36. First and second upper incisors small, with the summits of the crowns divided by a deep transverse groove into an anterior and a posterior cusp of nearly equal height; the third large and canine-like. Canines large, conical, pointed, recurved. Molars and premolars usually ⁵⁄₅, of which the second, third, and fourth are preceded by milk-teeth shed a few days after birth; sometimes (as in Fig. 271) a sixth upper molar (occasionally developed on one side and not the other); all with similar characters, generally uniradicular; crown moderate, compressed, pointed, with a single principal cusp, and sometimes a cingulum, and more or less developed anterior and posterior accessory cusps. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 4, C 9-14. Head rounded. Eyes large. Pinna of ear small, narrow, and pointed. Neck long. Skin of all the feet extended far beyond the nails and ends of the digits, with a deeply-lobed margin. The nails small and often quite rudimentary, especially those of the first and fifth toes of both feet, the best developed and most constant being the three middle claws of the hind foot, which are elongated, compressed, and curved.

The Eared-Seals, commonly called Sea-Bears or Sea-Lions, are widely distributed, especially in the temperate regions of both hemispheres, though absent from the coasts of the North Atlantic. As might be inferred from their power of walking on all fours, they spend more of their time on shore, and range inland to greater distances, than the true Seals, especially at the breeding time, though they are obliged always to return to the water to seek their food. They are gregarious and polygamous, and the males are usually much larger than the females, a circumstance which has given rise to some of the confusion existing in the specific determination of the various members of the genus. Some of the species possess, in addition to the stiff, close, hairy covering common to all the group, an exceedingly fine, dense, woolly under fur. The skins of these, when dressed and deprived of the longer harsh outer hairs, constitute the “seal-skin” of commerce, so much valued for wearing apparel, which is not the product of any of the true Seals. The best-known species are O. stelleri, the Northern Sea Lion, the largest of the genus, from the North Pacific, about 10 feet in length; O. jubata, the Patagonian or Southern Sea Lion (Fig. 272), from the Falkland Islands and Patagonia; O. californiana, from California, frequently exhibited alive in menageries in Europe; O. ursina, the common Sea-Bear or Fur-Seal of the North Pacific, the skins of which are imported in immense numbers from the Prybiloff Islands; O. pusilla, from the Cape of Good Hope; O. forsteri and others, from the coasts of Australia and various islands scattered over the southern hemisphere. These have been grouped by some zoologists into many genera, founded upon very trivial modifications of teeth and skull. In a recent memoir Mr. Beddard[517] concludes that if the genus be split up at all, it should be divided into Otaria, containing only O. jubata (with its numerous synonyms), and Arctocephalus, comprising all the other species. The latter group is distinguished by the more narrow and pointed nose, the longer ears, the palate not excavated nor truncated posteriorly, the presence of a hook-like process to the pterygoids, and by the posterior border of the nasals extending behind the zygoma.

The following account of O. ursina in the Prybiloff Islands is taken, with slight verbal alteration, from Nordenskiöld’s Voyage of the Vega: “The Sea-Bears are found year after year during summer at certain parts of the coast, known as ‘rookeries,’ where, collected in hundreds of thousands, they pass several months without the least food. The males or ‘bulls’ come first to the place, most of them in the month of May or in the beginning of June. The most violent conflicts, often with a deadly issue for one of the parties, now arise regarding the space of about a hundred square feet which each bull-seal considers necessary for his home. The strongest and most successful in fight retain the best places near the shore; the weaker have to crawl farther up on land, where the chances of getting a sufficient number of spouses are not particularly great. The fighting goes on with many feigned attacks and parades. At first the contest concerns only the proprietorship of the soil. The attacked, therefore, never follows his opponent beyond the area he has once taken up, but haughtily lays itself down, when the enemy has retired, in order to collect strength for a new combat. The animal in such a case grunts with satisfaction, throws himself on his back, scratches himself with his fore feet, attends to his toilet, or cools himself by slowly fanning with one of his hind feet; but he is always on the alert and ready for a new fight, until he is tired out and meets his match and is driven farther up from the beach. In the middle of June the females come up from the sea. At the water’s edge they are received in a very gallant way by some strong bulls that have succeeded in securing for themselves places next the shore, and now are bent by fair means or foul on annexing the females for their harem. But scarcely is the female that has come up out of the water established with male No. 1 than he rushes towards a new female on the surface of the water. Male No. 2 now stretches out his neck and without ceremony lays hold of the female of No. 1, to be afterwards exposed to a similar trick by No. 3. In such cases the females are quite passive, never fall out with each other, and bear with patience the severe wounds they often get when they are pulled about by the combatants, now in one direction, now in another. All the females are finally distributed in this way after furious combats among the males, those of the latter who are nearest the beach getting from 12 to 15 consorts to their share. Soon after landing the females bring forth their young, which are treated with great indifference, and are protected by their adopted father only within the limits of the harem. Next comes the pairing season, and when it has passed there is an end to the arrangement and distribution into families at first so strictly maintained. The males, rendered lean by three months’ absolute fasting, by degrees leave the rookery, which is left in possession of the Walruses and the young Sea Bears, including a number of young males that have not ventured to the place before. In the middle of September, when the young have learned to swim, the place is quite abandoned, with the exception of single animals that have for some reason remained behind.”

Family Trichechidæ.

In many characters the single genus representing this family is intermediate between the Otariidæ and Phocidæ, but it has a completely aberrant dentition. It has no external ears, as in the Phocidæ; but when on land the hind feet are turned forwards and used in progression, though less completely than in the Otariidæ. The upper canines are developed into immense tusks, which descend a long distance below the lower jaw. All the other teeth (Fig. 273), including the lower canines, are much alike, small, simple, and one-rooted, the molars with flat crowns. The skull is without postorbital process, but has an alisphenoid canal.

Trichechus.[518]—Dentition of young: i ²⁄₂, c ¹⁄₁, p and m ⁵⁄₄. Many of these teeth are, however, lost early or remain through life in a rudimentary state concealed by the gums. The teeth which are usually developed functionally are i ¹⁄₀, c ¹⁄₁, p ³⁄₃, m ⁰⁄₀; total 18. Vertebræ: C 7, D 14, L 6, S 4, C 12. Head round. Eyes rather small. Muzzle short and broad, with on each side a group of long, very stiff, bristly whiskers. The remainder of the hair-covering very short and adpressed. Tail very rudimentary. Fore feet with subequal toes, carrying five minute flattened nails. Hind feet with subequal toes, the fifth slightly the largest, having cutaneous lobes projecting beyond the ends as in Otaria; first and fifth with minute flattened nails; second, third, and fourth with large, elongated, subcompressed pointed nails.

Trichechus is the almost universally accepted generic name by which the Walrus or Morse[519] is known to zoologists, but some confusion has been introduced into literature by the revival of the nearly obsolete terms Rosmarus by some authors and Odobænus by others. T. rosmarus is the name of the species met with in the Arctic seas; that of the North Pacific, if distinct, is T. obesus. The preceding and following descriptions will apply equally to both. A full-grown male Walrus measures from 10 to 11 feet from the nose to the end of the very short tail, and is a heavy, bulky animal, especially thick about the shoulders. The soles of both fore and hind feet are bare, rough, and warty. The surface of the skin generally is covered with short, adpressed hair of a light, yellowish-brown colour, which, on the under parts of the body and base of the flippers, passes into dark reddish-brown or chestnut. In old animals the hair becomes more scanty, sometimes almost entirely disappearing, and the skin shows ample evidence of the rough life and pugnacious habits of the animal in the innumerable scars with which it is usually covered. It is everywhere more or less wrinkled, but especially over the shoulders, where it is thrown into deep and heavy folds.

The tusks are formidable weapons of defence, but their principal use seems to be scraping and digging among the sand and shingle for the molluscs and crustaceans on which the Walrus feeds. They are said also to aid in climbing up the slippery rocks and ledges of ice on which so much of the animal’s life is passed. Although this function of the tusks is affirmed by numerous authors, some of whom appear to have had opportunities of actual observation, it is explicitly denied by Malmgren.

Walruses are more or less gregarious in their habits, being met with generally in companies or herds of various sizes. They are only found near the coast or on large masses of floating ice, and rarely far out in the open sea; and, though often moving from one part of their feeding ground to another, they have no regular seasonal migrations. Their young are born between the months of April and June, usually but one at a time, never more than two. Their strong affection for their young, and their sympathy for each other in times of danger, have been particularly noticed by all who have had the opportunity of observing them in their native haunts. When one of their number is wounded, the whole herd usually join in a concerted and intelligent defence. Although harmless and inoffensive when not molested, they exhibit considerable fierceness when attacked, using their great tusks with tremendous effect either on human enemies who come into too close quarters or on Polar Bears, the only other adversaries they can meet with in their own natural territory. Their voice is a loud roaring, and can be heard at a great distance; it is described by Dr. Kane as “something between the mooing of a cow and the deepest baying of a mastiff, very round and full, with its bark or detached notes repeated rather quickly seven or nine times in succession.”

The principal food of the Walrus consists of bivalved molluscs, especially Mya truncata and Saxicava rugosa, two species very abundant in the Arctic regions, which it digs up from the mud and sand in which they lie buried at the bottom of the sea by means of its tusks. It crushes and removes the shells by the aid of its grinding teeth and tongue, swallowing only the soft part of the animal. It also feeds on other molluscs, sand-worms, star-fishes, and shrimps. Portions of various kinds of algæ or sea-weeds have been found in its stomach, but whether swallowed intentionally or not is still doubtful.

The commercial products of the Walrus are its oil, hide (used to manufacture harness and sole-leather and twisted into tiller ropes), and tusks. The ivory of the latter is, however, inferior in quality to that of the Elephant. Its flesh forms an important article of food to the Eskimo and Tchuktchis. Of the coast tribes of the last-named people the Walrus forms the chief means of support. “The flesh supplies them with food, the ivory tusks are made into implements used in the chase and for other domestic purposes, as well as a affording a valuable article of barter, and the skin furnishes the material for covering their summer habitations, harness for their dog-teams, and lines for their fishing gear” (Scammon).

Geographically the Walrus is confined to the northern circumpolar regions of the globe, extending apparently as far north as explorers have penetrated, but its southern range has been much restricted of late in consequence of the persecutions of man. On the Atlantic coast of America it was met with in the sixteenth century as low as the southern coast of Nova Scotia, and in the last century it was common in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and on the shores of Labrador. It still inhabits the coast round Hudson’s Bay, Davis Straits, and Greenland, where, however, its numbers are daily decreasing. It is not found on the Arctic coast of America between the 97th and 158th meridians. In Europe occasional stragglers have reached the British Isles, and it was formerly abundant on the coasts of Finmark. It is rare in Iceland, but Spitzbergen, Nova Zembla, and the western part of the north coast of Siberia are still constant places of resort, in all of which a regular war of extermination is carried on. The North Pacific, including both sides of Behring’s Strait, northern Kamschatka, Alaska, and the Pribyloff Islands, are also the haunts of numerous Walruses, which are isolated from those of the North Atlantic by the long stretches of coast, both of Siberia and North America, where they do not occur. The Pacific Walrus appears to be as large as, if not larger than, that of the Atlantic; its tusks are longer and more slender, and curved inwards; the whiskers are smaller, and the muzzle (of the skull) relatively deeper and broader. These and certain other minor differences have induced some naturalists to consider it specifically distinct under the name of Trichechus obesus. Its habits appear to be quite similar to those of the Atlantic form. Though formerly found in immense herds, it is rapidly becoming scarce, as the methods of destruction used by the American whalers, who have systematically entered upon its pursuit, are far more certain and deadly than those of the native Tchuktchis, to whom, as mentioned before, the Walrus long afforded the principal means of subsistence.

Fossil remains of Walruses and closely allied animals have been found in the United States, and in England, Belgium, and France, in deposits of Pliocene age.

Family Phocidæ.

The true Seals are the most completely adapted for aquatic life of all the Pinnipeds. When on land the hind limbs are extended behind them and take no part in progression, which is effected by a series of jumping movements produced by the muscles of the trunk, in some species aided by the fore limbs only. The palms and soles of the feet are hairy. There is no pinna to the ear, and no scrotum, the testes being abdominal. The upper incisors have simple, pointed crowns, and vary in number in the different groups. All the forms have well-developed canines and ⁵⁄₅ teeth of the cheek-series. In those species of which the milk-dentition is known, there are three milk molars (Fig. 275), which precede the second, third, and fourth permanent molars; the dentition is therefore p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁄₁, the first premolar having as usual no milk-predecessor. The skull has no postorbital process and no alisphenoid canal; and the angle of the mandible is not inflected. The fur is stiff and adpressed, without woolly under fur.

Subfamily Phocinæ.—Incisors ³⁄₂. All the feet with five well-developed claws. The toes on the hind feet subequal, the first and fifth not greatly exceeding the others in length, and with the interdigital membrane not extending beyond the toes.

Halichœrus.[520]—Dentition: i ³⁄₂, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁄₁; total 34. Crowns of molars large, simple, conical, recurved, slightly compressed, with sharp anterior and posterior edges, but without accessory cusps, except sometimes in the two hinder ones of the lower jaw. With the exception of the last one or two in the upper jaw and the last in the lower jaw they are all uniradicular. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 4, C 14.

One species, H. grypus, the Gray Seal of the coasts of Scandinavia and the British Isles (see page 604.)

Phoca.[521]—Dental formula as the last. Teeth smaller and more pointed. Molars (Figs. 275 and 276) with two roots (except the first in each jaw); and their crowns with accessory cusps. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 4, C 12-15. Head round and short. Fore feet short, with five very strong, subcompressed, slightly curved, rather sharp claws, subequal in length. On the hind feet the claws much narrower and less curved. The species of this genus are widely distributed throughout the northern hemisphere, and include P. barbata, the Bearded Seal; P. grœnlandica, the Greenland Seal; P. vitulina, the Common Seal (Fig. 277); and P. hispida, the Ringed Seal of the North Atlantic; P. caspica, from the Caspian and Aral Seas; and P. sibirica, from Lake Baikal.

Although the members of this subfamily swim and dive with the greatest ease, often remaining as much as a quarter of an hour or more below the surface, and are dependent for their sustenance entirely on living prey captured in the water, yet they frequently resort to sandy beaches, rocks, or ice-floes, either to sleep or to bask in the sun, and especially for the purpose of bringing forth their young. The latter appears to be the universal habit, and, strange as it may seem, the young seals—of some species at least—take to the water at first very reluctantly, and have actually to be taught to swim by their parents. The number of young produced is usually one annually, though occasionally two. They are at first covered with a coat of very thick, soft, nearly white fur, and until it falls off they do not usually enter the water. This occurs in the Greenland and Gray Seal when from two to three weeks old, but in the Common Seal apparently much earlier. One of this species born in the London Zoological Gardens had shed its infantile woolly coat and was swimming and diving about in its pond within three hours after its birth. The movements of the true Seals upon the ground or ice are very different from those of the Eared-Seals. Thus the hinder limbs (by which mainly they propel themselves through the water) are on land always perfectly passive, stretched backwards, with the soles of the feet applied to each other, and often raised to avoid contact with the ground. Sometimes the fore limbs are equally passive, being placed close to the sides of the body, and motion is then effected by a shuffling or wriggling action produced by the muscles of the trunk. When, however, there is any necessity for a more rapid mode of progression the animals use the fore paws, either alternately or simultaneously, pressing the palmar surface on the ground and lifting and dragging the body forwards in a succession of short jumps. In this way they manage to move so fast that a man has to step out beyond a walk to keep up with them; but such rapid action costs considerable effort, and they very soon become heated and exhausted. These various modes of progression appear to be common to all species so far as has been observed.

Most kinds of Seals are gregarious and congregate, especially at the breeding season, in immense herds. Such is the habit of the Greenland Seal (Phoca grœnlandica), which resorts in the spring to the ice-floes of the North Sea, around Jan Mayen Island, where about 200,000 are killed annually by the crews of the Scotch, Dutch, and Norwegian sealing vessels. Others, like the Common Seal of the British islands (P. vitulina), though having a wide geographical range, are never met with in such large numbers or far away from land. This species is stationary all the year round, but some have a regular season of migration, moving south in winter and north in summer. They are usually harmless, timid, inoffensive animals, though, being polygamous, the old males often fight desperately with each other, their skins being frequently found covered with wounds and scars. They are greatly attached to their young, and remarkably docile and easily trained when in captivity; indeed, although there would seem little in the structure or habits of the Seal to fit it by nature to be a companion of man, yet there is perhaps no wild animal which attaches itself so readily to the person who takes care of and feeds it. Seals appear to have much curiosity, and it is a very old and apparently well-attested observation that they are strongly attracted by musical sounds. Their sense of smell is very acute, and their voice varies from a harsh bark or grunt to a plaintive bleat. Seals feed chiefly on fish, of which they consume enormous quantities; some, however, subsist largely on crustaceans, especially species of Gammarus, which swarm in the northern seas, also on molluscs, echinoderms, and even occasionally sea-birds, which they seize when swimming or floating on the water.

Although the true Seals do not possess the beautiful under fur (“seal-skin” of the furriers) which makes the skin of the Sea-Bears so precious, yet their hides are still sufficiently valuable as articles of commerce, together with the oil yielded by their fat, to subject them to a devastating persecution, by which their numbers are being continually diminished.

Two species of seals only are met with regularly on the British coasts, the Common Seal and the Gray Seal. The former (Fig. 277) is a constant resident in all suitable localities round the Scottish, Irish, and English coasts, from which it has not been driven away by the molestations of man. Although, naturally, the most secluded and out-of-the-way spots are selected as their habitual dwelling-places, there are few localities where they may not be occasionally met with. Within the writers’ knowledge one was seen not many years ago lying on the shingly beach at so populous a place as Brighton, and another was caught in the river Welland, near Stamford, 30 miles from the sea. They frequent bays, inlets, and estuaries, and are often seen on sandbanks or mudflats left dry at low tide, and, unlike some of their congeners, are not found on the ice-floes of the open sea, nor, though gregarious, are very large numbers ever seen in one spot. The young are produced at the end of May or beginning of June. They feed chiefly on fish, and the destruction they occasion among salmon is well known to Scottish fishermen. The Common Seal is widely distributed, being found not only on the European and American coasts bordering the Atlantic Ocean, but also in the North Pacific. It is from 4 to 5 feet in length, and variable in colour, though usually yellowish-gray, with irregular spots of dark brown or black above and yellowish-white beneath. The Gray Seal (Halichœrus grypus) is of considerably larger size, the males attaining when fully adult a length of 8 feet from nose to end of hind feet. It is of a yellowish-gray colour, lighter beneath, and with dark gray spots or blotches, but, like most other Seals, is liable to great variations of colour according to age. This species appears to be restricted to the North Atlantic, having been rarely seen on the American coasts, but not farther south than Nova Scotia; it is chiefly met with on the coasts of Ireland, England, Scotland, Norway, and Sweden, including the Baltic and Gulf of Bothnia, and Iceland, though it does not appear to range farther north. It is apparently not migratory, and its favourite breeding places are rocky islands; the young being born in the end of September or beginning of October.

Subfamily Monachinæ.—Incisors ²⁄₂. Cheek-teeth two-rooted, except the first. On the hind feet the first and fifth toes greatly exceeding the others in length, with nails rudimentary or absent.

Monachus.[522]—Dentition: i ²⁄₂, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁄₁; total 32. Crowns of molars strong, conical, compressed, hollowed on the inner side, with a strongly marked lobed cingulum, especially on the inner side, and slightly developed accessory cusps before and behind. The first and last upper and the first lower molar considerably smaller than the others. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 2, C 11. All the nails of both fore and hind feet very small and rudimentary. One species, M. albiventer, the Monk-Seal of the Mediterranean and adjacent parts of the Atlantic.

The other genera[523] of this section have the same dental formula, but are distinguished by the characters of the cheek-teeth and the feet. They are all inhabitants of the shores of the southern hemisphere.

Ogmorhinus.[524]—All the teeth of the cheek-series with three distinct pointed cusps, deeply separated from each other; of these the middle or principal cusp is largest and slightly recurved; the other two (anterior and posterior) are nearly equal in size, and have their apices directed towards the middle one. Skull much elongated. One species, O. leptonyx, the Sea-Leopard, widely distributed in the Antarctic and southern temperate seas.

Lobodon.[525]—Cheek-teeth with much-compressed elongated crowns and a principal recurved cusp, rounded and somewhat bulbous at the apex, and one anterior, and one, two, or three posterior, very distinct accessory cusps. One species, L. carcinophaga.

Pœcilophoca.[526]—Cheek-teeth small, with simple, subcompressed, conical crowns, having a broad cingulum, but no distinct accessory cusps. One species, P. weddelli.

Ommatophoca.[527]—All the teeth very small; those of the cheek-series with pointed recurved crowns, and small posterior and still less developed anterior accessory cusps. Orbits very large. Nails quite rudimentary on front, and absent on hind feet. The skull bears a considerable resemblance to that of the members of the next subfamily, towards which it may form a transition. There is one species, O. rossi, of which very little is known.

Subfamily Cystophorinsæ.—Incisors ²⁄₁. Teeth of cheek-series generally one-rooted. Nose of males with an appendage capable of being inflated. First and fifth toes of hind feet greatly exceeding the others in length, with prolonged cutaneous lobes, and rudimentary or no nails.

Cystophora.[528]—Dentition: i ²⁄₁, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ¹⁄₁; total 30. The last molar has generally two distinct roots. Beneath the skin over the face of the adult male, and connected with the nostrils, is a sac which, when inflated, forms a kind of hood covering the upper part of the head. Nails present, though small, on the hind feet. One species, C. cristata, the Hooded or Bladder-Nose Seal of the Polar Seas.

Macrorhinus.[529]—Dentition as the last, but cheek-teeth of simpler character, and all one-rooted. All the teeth, except the canines, very small relatively to the size of the animal. Hind feet without nails. Vertebræ: C 7, D 15, L 5, S 3, C 11. Nose of adult male produced into a short tubular proboscis, ordinarily flaccid, but capable of dilatation and elongation under excitement. One species, M. leoninus, the Elephant Seal, or Sea-Elephant of the whalers, the largest of the whole family, attaining the length of nearly 20 feet. Formerly abundant in the Antarctic Seas, and also found on the coast of California.

Extinct Seals.—Remains of animals of this group have been found in late Miocene and Pliocene strata in Europe and America, the most abundant and best-preserved being those of the Pliocene Antwerp Crag, the subject of an illustrated monograph by Van Beneden. Nothing has, however, yet been discovered which throws any light upon the origin of the group, since all the extinct forms at present known come within the definition of the existing families; and, though annectant forms between these occur, there are as yet no transitions to a more generalised type of mammal. Indeed, all those of which the characters are best known belong to the completely developed Phocine or Trichechine, and not to the Otariine, type. The typical genus Phoca occurs in the Antwerp Crag, while remains of Seals provisionally referred to this genus are found in the Pliocene of the Crimea and the Miocene of Malta and Virginia. Of the other Antwerp forms Callophoca is said to be allied to Phoca grœnlandica, Platyphoca to Phoca barbata, Phocanella to Phoca foetida, Gryphoca to Halichœrus, Palæophoca and Monatherium to Monachus, and Mesotaria to Cystophora; while Prophoca does not appear to come very close to any existing form. It should be observed that it is extremely doubtful whether all these fossil Seals are really entitled to generic distinction.

Suborder Creodonta.

The discovery of fossil remains in Eocene and early Miocene formations both in Europe and North America shows that numerous species of terrestrial carnivorous animals existed upon the earth during those periods which cannot be referred to either of the sections into which the order has now become broken up. By some zoologists these have been supposed to be Marsupials, or at least to show transitional characters between the Metatherian and Eutherian subclasses. By others they are looked upon as belonging altogether to the latter group, and as the common ancestors of existing Carnivores and Insectivores, or perhaps rather as descendants or relatives of such common ancestors, retaining more of the generalised characters than any of the existing species. They shade off almost insensibly into numerous other forms less distinctly carnivorous, to the whole of which, including the modern Insectivora, Cope (to whom we are indebted for much of our knowledge of the American extinct species) gives the name of Bunotheria, those more specially related to the existing Carnivora forming the suborder Creodonta. These are instances, however, in which the application of the principles of classification adopted in the case of existing species, of which the entire structure is known, and which have become divided into isolated groups by the extinction of intermediate forms, is almost impossible. If the generally accepted view of evolution is true, and the extreme modifications pass insensibly into each other by minute gradations (a view the palæontological proof of which becomes strengthened by every fresh discovery), there must be many of these extinct forms which cannot be assigned to definitely characterised groups. There are, however, some which stand out prominently from the others as formed on distinct types, having no exact representatives at present living on the earth.

The more typical Creodonts appear, however, to be so closely related to the true Carnivora through the extinct Miacidæ (p. 539), that it is on the whole advisable to regard them as representing a distinct suborder of Carnivora. In the strong development of the canines (Fig. 278) they are distinguished from the modern Insectivora; and they also differ from the latter and resemble the true Carnivores in the form of the incisors, the second one in the lower jaw (when three are present) being thrust up above the level of the other two in the manner obtaining in most of the modern Carnivora. Some of the most generalised forms included in the present group approximate so closely to the Condylarthrous Ungulates as to indicate that both groups have probably had a common origin.

The Creodonta as a whole are characterised by the small size of the brain, the absence of a single differentiated carnassial tooth, and the triangular form or secant character of their upper molars. In the carpus the scaphoid and lunar were usually distinct; the femur has a third trochanter; the upper or tibial surface of the astragalus usually wants the groove found in modern Carnivores: and the feet were plantigrade. The curious resemblance of the molars of many of these forms to those of the Marsupials may indicate a genetic relationship between the two groups; but, on the other hand, the presence of a full set of milk-teeth and the absence of palatal vacuities, or of an inflection of the angle of the mandible, sharply distinguishes them from that order. Space permits of a notice only of the more interesting forms.

Hyænodontidæ.—This family is taken to include some of the more specialised types, such as the European and American Hyænodon and Oxhyæna and the European Pterodon. In Hyænodon (Fig. 278) the dental formula is i ³⁄₃, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ²⁄₃; the fourth premolar above and the first true molar below being formed upon the “carnassial” plan, but the teeth behind these, instead of being tuberculated as in all existing Carnivora, repeat the characters of the carnassial, and also increase in size, especially in the lower jaw, from before backwards. The last lower molar differs from the two preceding teeth, and is very like the carnassial of Felis. The scaphoid and lunar of the carpus were fused together. Some species, as H. leptorhynchus, were as large as a Wolf, while others did not exceed a Fox in size. Pterodon is readily distinguished by having m ³⁄₃, by the larger size of the inner tubercles of the upper molars, and the similarity in the form of the three lower molars. In some species there were only two upper incisors, and the first lower premolar may be wanting. Oxhyæna is a specialised form with i ²⁻³⁄₀, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ²⁄₂, and a very long mandibular symphysis.

Proviverridæ.—The European and American genus Proviverra (Cynohyænodon or Stypolophus) may be regarded as representing a second family. The dental formula in this genus is the typical i ³⁄₃, c ¹⁄₁, p ⁴⁄₄, m ³⁄₃, the upper molars have a large inner tubercle, while the lower molars are differentiated into a blade and talon, the blade having a large inner cusp. The upper teeth closely resemble the molars of Dasyurus, while the lower molars are like the lower carnassial of Cynodictis and Viverra; and thus indicate how the Creodonts may have passed into the true Carnivores through the extinct Miacidæ.