64 THE TRUE DOLPHIN. 



The appearance of a shoal of these animals, at 

 sea, moving in the same direction, is considered by 

 experienced mariners as an indication of an approach- 

 ing storm, which very certainly follows their appear- 

 ance. Falconer, in his beautiful poem of the Ship- 

 wreck, thus describes such a circumstance: 



" Now to the north from burning Afric's shore, 

 A troop of porpoises their course explore; 

 In curling wreaths they gambol on the tide, 

 . Now bound aloft, now down the billow glide: 

 Their tracks awhile the hoary waves retain 

 That burn in sparkling trails along the main — - 

 These fleetest coursers of the finny race, 

 When threatening clouds th' ethereal vault deface, 

 Their route to leeward still sagacious form, 

 To shun the fury of the approaching storm." 



Canto II. § II. 



Relative to the breeding season of the dolphin, 

 we have no information sufficiently exact to be re- 

 lied on. We have seen them in Long Island Sound 

 during the month of August, and the first part of 

 September, accompanied by suckers, varying in size, 

 and from eighteen inches to two feet or more in 

 length. In swimming, or rather in plunging, as 

 heretofore described, the sucker apparently rested 

 on the lateral or humeral fin of the parent, as it al- 

 ways was seen as if adhering to the same place by 

 the side of the parent, in all the movements made 

 in ascending or descending. 



