54 FOLLOW THE WHALE 



ance and gave it two dorsal and four ventral fins like a fish, while they 

 sometimes added a gill slit. In their more elaborate representations, 

 the body is sometimes greatly elongated and the dorsal fin is shifted 

 forward so that it becomes a sort of crest, like a cock's comb. There 

 was also a convention which persisted until Christian times, and 

 which to a certain extent still remains with us, that the dolphin 

 should be shown in a crescentic form with the back arched into a 

 semicircle and the belly concave. Actually the animal cannot bend 

 to this extent, even when leaping free of the waves. It gives the im- 

 pression of doing so, however, because when so engaged, the head 

 and tail are turned down and the whole animal describes an arc. Pic- 

 tures of dolphins thus curved do, moreover, give the impression of 

 movement and speed, and this was greatly appreciated by the highly 

 artistic Mediterranean peoples. 



It is also upon the subject of dolphins that we come to the first 

 matter-of-fact and contemporary treatises on any whale. Further, 

 these writings contain not only descriptions of the animals but also 

 mention of the uses to which they were put by ancient man. As it 

 is our intention to follow the whales as well as the whalers, we may 

 therefore turn unreservedly to these records that were so obligingly 

 compiled for us by those ancient moderns, the Greeks, with their 

 somewhat puckish erudition. 



In 326 B.C., Alexander of Macedon reached India and conquered 

 the rich Indus valley. He had every intention of proceeding into the 

 Ganges valley and subduing the whole subcontinent but his ragged 

 army was utterly exhausted by years of meandering campaigns 

 through half of Asia, and he was persuaded to turn back. He divided 

 his forces, putting all those that he could find in the ranks of his 

 army with any knowledge of the sea under the command of one 

 Nearchus, whom he instructed to build a fleet and sail back to 

 Mesopotamia along the Makran coast, keeping in touch with his 

 army as it moved west through Persia. A very large number went 

 with Nearchus and it is manifest that sufficient shipping to transport 

 this host could not have been assembled or built if the country in 

 which they found themselves had not been versed in seamanship. It 

 appears, moreover, at least by the account of Arrian, that the Indians 

 built eight hundred ships for Nearchus, and this in a surprisingly 

 short time. Some of them were of three hundred tons burthen. 



