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Show 1881.] MR. R. COLLETT ON THE GREY SEAL. 381 number of islets, many of which are invisible at high tide and in calm weather; but during stormy weather, and when an onshore wind is blowing, the sea breaks on them with great fury, making this part of the sea one of the most perilous along the coast. Mr. F. Borthen, the sole proprietor of these islands, has with great readiness on several occasions given me full particulars concerning the stay of the Seals at this group. I have already on one or two occasions made known the more important details of these notes (the last time in 1876'), without, however, having examined the specimens themselves, on which account I erroneously referred them to Phoca barbata, the name under which the specimens from this locality, all of them in their blackish (not grey) dress, have hitherto been exhibited in our Norwegian museums. In December last year, after having examined a specimen that Mr. Borthen had kindly presented to the University's Museum in Chris-tiania, I discovered that the species from the Fro Islands is Halichcerus grypus, and not Phoca barbata, a mistake which I have the greatest reason to regret2. I have carefully gone through the particulars received from Mr. Borthen with that gentleman, both verbally and in writing; and as they are in every respect quite reliable, and on certain points more complete than any we have hitherto been acquainted with regarding any other kind of northern Seal, I give them here, together with observations made in subsequent years. A. Breeding-habits. The breeding of H. grypus takes place on the Fro Islands in the autumn. In the middle of September they begin to assemble rapidly from the south on the most northern of the Fro Islands in order to breed, especially about two miles south of the fishing-station Halton, the most northern point of the group. None appear to come from the north ; the coast in this direction being less provided with such sunken rocks and islets as these Seals are in the habit of resorting to. The next breeding-place to the north of the Fro Islands is probably on the outer side of the Vigten Islands, a long and projecting group of islands on the border of Helgeland, about one degree further north. The number of Seals belonging to the Fro-Islands breeding-district 1 Lilljeborg, ' Sveriges och Norges Kyggradsdjur.' I. Daggdjuren, p. 701 (Upsala, 1874); Fogh, Liitken, Warming, ' Tidsskrift for populare Frem-stillinger af Naturvidenskaben,' 5 E . 3 B . p. 14 (Kjobenhavn, 1876); Collett, ' Bemasrknmger til Norges Pattedyrfauna (Nyt Magazin for Naturviden-skabeme,' 22 B. 1 & 2 H. p. 210, Christiania, 1876). * In a most exhaustive and excellent work, ' History of North-American Pinnipeds' (Washington, 1880), Dr. Allen has given a monograph of those species of the families Kosmaridae, OtariidiB, and Phocidaj which belong to the North-American fauna. In this work, in which Dr. Allen with great critical discernment has reviewed what was previously known through the observations of different naturalists, he has with good reason expressed some doubts whether I may not have confused the two above-mentioned species in the remarks which I have made in m y papers on the subject. |