NATURAL HISTORY 



OP 



THE ORDER CETACEA, 



" There are none, O Lord, who can compete with thee in the creation 

 of thy wondrous and stupendous works ; for they alone are sufficient to 

 convince mankind of thy existence." 



INTRODUCTION. 



The cetaceous animals constitute the last order of the 

 class mammalia, or mammiferous animals, in most of 

 the modern systems of zoology, especially those of 

 Linnaeus, Blumenbach, and Cuvier, by whom the na- 

 tural history of these animals has been denominated 

 cetology: this may be denned to be that department 

 of zoology which treats of the structure, economy, and 

 history of cetaceous animals, or of whales and those in- 

 habitants of the deep which resemble them in their 

 anatomical structure. 



Few of these animals appear to have been known to 

 the ancients, as we meet with but little respecting them 

 in the writings of the first zoologists. Both Aristotle and 

 Pliny, however, mention several of those species with 

 which naturalists are now acquainted. Thus the former, 



B 



