76 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



The Shetland Company began operations first, un- 

 fortunately before their factory was ready, and killed six 

 whales, most of which were lost. A flensed whale does not 

 smell badly in salt water, but the smell of an unflensed 

 whale is very bad. The Norrna steamer came in on I 3th 

 June, with two Finners or Rorqual (Bal&noptera nmsculus), 

 the largest of which was 68 feet long, a bull. The result of 

 the first nine days was five Finners. 



On 26th June, 1903, Captain Castberg sent me a 

 message to come and see a big whale. On getting to the 

 station we found a Sperm Whale, the dimensions of which 

 were given to me as, length 68 feet, girth 40 feet. As is 

 always the case in these waters, it was a bull, one out of a 

 school of five, but he gave some trouble to secure, and the 

 others went off. My friend took some photographs of him. 

 He was an enormous animal. In the lower jaw there were 

 24 teeth, one, which I afterwards measured, was 8 inches 

 long and 6^ in circumference. His stomach was full of the 

 remains of a cephalopod, which, from the size of the pieces, 

 must have been of very large dimensions. There were a 

 number of beaks of the "squid," one before me is i^ inches 

 in length, but there was no ambergris. The outer skin 

 resembled black oil silk, and was translucent. I am unable 

 to state the amount of oil and spermaceti obtained, but the 

 value of the whale came to about .300. 



Some time afterwards another species of whale was 

 killed, the peculiarity being that this one is always covered 

 with barnacles. It was cut up when I saw it and I was 

 unable to identify it. 



Later on the whales seemed to get larger, and one was 

 killed 84 feet in length. This I did not see, but was told 

 it was a Finner (B. musculus}. From the size I should 

 have thought it to be Sibbald's Rorqual (B. sibbaldii\ but 

 was told not. Late in the year two of these were seen going 

 south at a great speed, but, so far as I know, none were killed. 



On 3rd July 1903, the whaler " Suderoe " came to 

 Ronas Voe, from Faroe. I went on board and was shown 

 a blade of whale-bone about seven feet long taken from a 

 Greenland Right Whale (Balcena inysticetus} killed in latitude 

 61 N. and 4 W. longitude, shortly before. 



