THE PRESENT SURVIVAL OF OPEN BOAT WHALING 329 



These customary approaches, traditional from the American fishery, take advantage of the accepted 

 oblique or sidelong vision of the Sperm whale. The position of the eye is such that the visual angle is 

 certainly curtailed behind, where the blind arc contains about forty degrees on either side of the mid- 

 line. The species is also said not to be able to see ahead, but actually it is still doubtful how good 

 the angular vision is in front, because the head, in spite of its great length and bulk, has hollow-lines 

 about the level of the eyes, and these increase in depth towards the bluff of the forehead. This can be 

 seen in Plate XVI, Fig. 5, which shows the eye and the hollow-lines. Presumably these longtitudinal 

 depressions allow the animal a more extensive forward vision than is generally supposed, at least when 

 travelling head-out. Colnett, in his legend to a drawing of a Sperm whale, made this point as early 

 as 1798; it has again been observed in recent years by Ashley (1926, p. 78). In practice, however, 

 since 'taking the whale head and head' (called cabega com cabega in the Azores) is a recognized 

 method of approach, the vision immediately ahead must be assumed to be at least ineffectual: we do 

 not in any case know how efficient are the underwater and aerial aspects of seeing in the Sperm 

 whale. 



When going on head and head the boat is set towards the forehead of the whale, at first by lining 

 the emergence of the dorsal fin or hump (Az. ampo) a fraction to the left of the spout (Az. espato) and 

 afterwards, when near enough, by direct glimpses of the bluff of the forehead. When very near, the 

 harponeer stands up, bracing his thigh in the clumsy cleat : the boatheader steers to one side of the 

 animal and then, with a single sweep of his stern-oar, ' lays the boat on ' so that the bow turns in to- 

 wards the whale at" a point, if all has gone well, a little behind the back of the head. ' Choosing his 

 chance ', but almost in the same moment, the harponeer darts his iron : the men give a stroke or so 

 astern to clear the boat, and the whale is fastened and taking out the line. Going on head and head 

 has the advantage that the whale is more rapidly overtaken because pursuer and quarry are in fact 

 travelling towards each other. The disadvantage does not lie in gallying the whale by rapidly crossing 

 the eye, since this happens in an instant and is immediately followed by the dart: it lies in the likeli- 

 hood of a too hasty dart striking too far forward on the very tough integument of the head, where the 

 iron is most unlikely to enter deep enough to fasten properly. Presumably for this reason, and for the 

 greater peril which, in my opinion, invests this approach, it is unusual to go on head and head in 

 the Azores. The commonest practice, and one more likely to be favoured by the relative positions 

 of boat and whale during the chase, is to ' go on the flukes ', keeping the hump and the spout in 

 line from astern, and making the last approach on the whale's quarter and towards the hump : the 

 boat is laid on with the stern-oar, the iron darted, and the boat cleared as when going on head and 

 head. 



The whaleboat is not infrequently laid on so that the bow actually bumps against the whale's flank. 

 I have myself been in such a boat going on ' wood to blackskin '. In such a case the harpoon, which has 

 been poised above the head in both hands with the point directed downwards, is struck into the whale 

 with a movement from the hips which so doubles the harponeer as to threaten his balance. Darted in 

 this way, the iron often buries all its shank to the socket, or ' to the hitches ', in the phrase of American 

 whaling. In any case the dart is not a good one unless the iron is ' fleshed ', driven quite through the 

 blubber thickness so that the head toggles in the muscle but is afterwards strained against the firm 

 inner surface of the blubber where it is not likely to draw. Besides bumping the whale wood and 

 blackskin (Az. blequesquine), it more often happens that the boat approaches so that the iron is darted 

 from a distance of between 1 fm. and 3 fm. The dart caught in the cine-film still (Plate XV) was about 

 z\ fm. and was successful. Darting even at this distance requires skill and great reserve of strength 

 in a man who is already strained bv pulling and paddling. A dart of 4 fm. would be exceptional, were 

 it not that there certainly appear to be ' long-dart men ' in the present Azores whaling who can even 



