100 THE WHALE. 



follows in relation to the whale, is selected from 

 the different works of the accurate and philosophical 

 Scoresby. 



The Whale. 



This valuable and interesting animal, generally 

 called the whale by way of eminence, is the object of 

 our most important commerce to the polar seas — is 

 productive of more oil than any other of the cetacea, 

 and being less active, slower in its motion, and more 

 timid than any other of the kind, of similar or near- 

 ly similar magnitude, is more easily captured. 



Large as the size of the whale certainly is, it has 

 been much over-rated; for such is the avidity with 

 which the human mind receives communications of 

 the marvellous, and such the interest attached to those 

 researches, which describe any remote and extraordi- 

 nary production of nature, that the judgment of the 

 traveller receives a bias, which, in cases of doubt, in- 

 duces him to fix upon that extreme point in his 

 opinion, which is calculated to afford the greatest 

 surprise and interest. Hence, if he perceives an 

 animal remarkable for its minuteness, he is inclined 

 to compare it with something still more minute: if 

 remarkable for its bigness, with something fully 

 larger. When the animal inhabits an element 

 where he can not examine it, or is seen under any 

 circumstance which prevent the possibility of his 

 determining its dimensions, his decision will cer- 

 tainly be in that extreme which excites the most 



