ARCTIC ZOOLOGY. 125 



animal re-appears and breathes his last. This scene is ex- 

 hibited in Plate XI. 



The whale, after death, always turns on the back. The 

 fins are then lashed together, perforations are made in 

 the tail, and a rope is passed through, and thence round 

 the rump ; when all the boats, passing lines from one to 

 the other, proceed to tow the monster towards the ship, 

 which is usually so managed as to meet them, in order to 

 lessen the fatigue. When brought along side, the body is 

 properly secured for the operation of flinching. This con- 

 sists in digging off the blubber, or cellular substance, from 

 the muscular parts, in large slips, sometimes of half a ton 

 weight, but all of a regular form, which are lifted on deck 

 by the help of the Avindlass, and the labour of many hands, 

 who toil incessantly until the spohation is completed. The 

 whale-bone, as it is called, is carefully dug out, as well as 

 the massy tongue ; the former for its peculiar importance, 

 and the latter as being almost entirely of blubber. The 

 bones of the lower jaw are also removed, being a private 

 perquisite of the master, and so would the frontal or 

 crown bone too, were it not for the extreme difficulty of 

 separating it from the body. Then finally the remotest 

 joint that can be marked in the lumbar vertebrae or rump, 

 is severed, and the crang,* as is called the residue of the 



* Crang probably bears some relation to the Latin term for muscular flesh. 



