Class IV. COMMON WHALE. 53 



Awn; %«y?uo5bv7«$. avxioias hvr axovlag, 



Halieut. V. lin. 526. 



Whofe dreadful teeth in triple order ftand, 

 Like fpears out of his mouth. 



The whale, though fo bulky an animal, fwims 

 with vaft fwiftnefs, and generally againft the wind. 



It brings only two young at a time, as we be- 

 lieve is the cafe with all other whales. 



Its food is a certain fort of fmall fnail, and as Foo®. 

 Linnaus fays, the medufa, or fea blubber. 



The great refort of this fpecies is within the 

 arttic circle, but they fometimes vifit our coafts. 

 Whether this was the Britijh whale of the antients 

 we cannot pretend to fay, only we find, from a line 

 in Juvenal^ that it was of a very large fize \ 



Quanto Delphinis Balana Britannica major. 



Sat. X, 



As much as Britijh whales in fize furpafs 

 The dolphin race. 



To view thefe animals in a commercial light, we 

 muft add, that the Englijh were late before they 

 engaged in the whale-fifhery : it appears by a fet of 

 queries, propofed by an honeft merchant in the 

 year 1575, in order to get information in the 

 bufinefs, that we were at that time totally igno- 



E 3 rant 



