20 FOLLOW THE WHALE 



inches in height. The front edge of this fin often bears a line of 

 small tubercles which are thought to be remnants of a body armor 

 that clothed the terrestrial ancestors of the whales. The eyes are 

 very small and the external opening of the ear, which is situated 

 about two inches behind the eye, is no bigger than a pinhole. It has 

 a half-moon-shaped blowhole on the top of the head but it does not 

 blow a jet of vapor like the larger whales. 



The porpoise has very stiff, rubbery lips, and the mouth is bright 

 pink inside and contains a fleshy tongue which cannot be pro- 

 truded. It has about twenty-five small teeth on either side of both 

 jaws, arranged in regular rows and all the same in form. They are 

 unlike the teeth of any other whale, being shaped like little spades 

 with a peglike root and an expanded crown that may bear three dis- 

 tinct lobes. Porpoises feed on fish of various kinds according to the 

 season and the area where they live, their favorites being herring, 

 pilchard, mackerel, whiting, rock cod, and eels, but they also take 

 squids and crabs, and they have been known to eat salmon. They 

 consume enormous quantities of food and are not on the whole 

 popular with commercial fisherfolk, but there is a belief current in 

 many areas that it is unlucky to kill them. It seems that at times herds 

 of them have virtually been tamed, so that they hang about shallow 

 waters near shore, and when a school of fish appears, the people 

 stir up the porpoises, which immediately dash off among the fish, 

 eating quantities but often enough herding the rest right up on to 

 the beach. 



There is some interest in the origin of the name porpoise. The 

 Romans seem to have called the animal alternatively porcus pisciSy 

 the *'fat fish," or Tnarirmm suem^ the "sea pig," from which most of 

 our names for these animals are derived. Thus the Italians call them 

 pOTCO pesce, and the French used to call them porpeis or simply 

 pore poisson, while the Old English spellings are porkpisce, porpus, 

 or porpesse. Porpoises are also, however, sometimes called hogfish, 

 sea hogs, or herring hogs. From the other stem are derived the Ger- 

 man meerschwein, meaning sea pig, and the more usual French name 

 of marsouin. The Laplanders call them niser and they have fished 

 them since before the dawn of history. 



The porpoises are coastal animals which apparently seldom ven- 

 ture far out into the open ocean. They like estuaries and often 



