The Glow Spreads West 67 



other whale except the La Plata River dolphin, is a single longi- 

 tudinal slit. Susus are usually solitary animals but they occasionally 

 travel in pairs and are sometimes seen in great numbers in certain 

 stretches of rivers where food is plentiful. The inhabitants of various 

 parts of India eat the beast. It is strange that this, one of the most 

 obscure of all whales, should have been one of the first to be given 

 a name and individual mention in the world's literature. 



Pliny also makes some observations upon the whales of the west- 

 ern seas and the Atlantic. He states that the Balaenae, or true whales, 

 penetrate the Mediterranean but are more common off the coast of 

 Spain, though "not before the winter solstice because they retire at 

 periodical seasons to calve in a large bay." This, as we shall see later, 

 refers to the Bay of Biscay and was an accurate observation upon a 

 fact that had great bearing on the future history of western Europe. 

 He says that there is also in the western seas the Orca, "which cannot 

 in any way be adequately described, but as an enormous mass of 

 flesh armed with teeth." This animal he rightly reports as attacking 

 the female whales when they are sluggish with calf, and herding 

 them on to shoals when they make a dash for the open sea, which is 

 their only means of defense. 



He concludes by saying, "The largest animals that are found in 

 the Indian Ocean are the Pristis and the Balaena, while in the Gallic 

 Ocean the Physeter is the most bulky inhabitant, raising itself aloft 

 like some vast column, and as it towers above the sails of ships, 

 belching forth as it were a deluge of water." The scientific name 

 given to the sperm whale is, for this reason, Physeter, and it is indeed 

 to the western oceans that we must now turn in order to follow the 

 whale. The world of the ancients only glimpsed these monstrous 

 creatures; we are now to view them at very much closer quarters. 



