WHALES AND MERMAIDS 



315 



between the head and the trunk, while posteriorly it 

 tapers gradually to and in an expanded tail fin is very 

 fish-like, while their single pair of paddles are much 

 more like fins than are those of the dugong and manatee. 

 Nevertheless, in all essentials, whales and porpoises are 

 true " beasts." They possess all the characteristics of 

 that class, and are both warm-blooded and suckle their 

 young. Not only is a whale much more like a bat or a 

 squirrel than it is like a fish, but in many respects there 

 is much more difference between a fish and a whale than 

 there is between a whale and a humming-bird. 



FIG. 80. 



THE GREENLAND WHALE. 



But whales and porpoises form a group or order of 

 animals which is exceedingly well defined and distinct 

 from every other order of mammals. Of all beasts they 

 are the most completely and exclusively organised for 

 aquatic life, being perfectly helpless on land, more so 

 than even the dugong and manatee, and out of all com- 

 parison more so than seals or otters. On the other 

 hand, no beasts are so perfectly at home in the open 

 ocean, where the majority of species constantly disport 

 themselves, though a few are inhabitants of rivers. 



The true, or Greenland, whale is one of the largest 

 animals which now lives, or, so far as we yet know, ever has 

 lived, being from forty-five to fifty feet in length. More 



