THE IMPENETRABLE SEA 



bases transversely on each side of the whale's mouth. 

 They are smooth and straight on the outer edges but the 

 inner ones are fringed with bristle. These bristles become 

 matted together, forming the meshes of the whale's 

 "sieve", with which it is able to strain from the sea- water 

 which floods into its mighty mouth the small fish and 

 planktonic creatures upon which it feeds. The water is 

 squeezed out through the baleen strainers by the action 

 of the whale's tongue. 



Baleen is widely used commercially, owing to its great 

 lightness, strength and flexibility, the ease with which it 

 can be split, and its power to stand high temperatures 

 without change. ''Whalebone" is a misleading term, for 

 the substance is not bone ; nor is it fin, as implied in the 

 commercial term ''whale-fin". It is an epidermic (or 

 skin) substance closely resembling hair in its nature. One 

 of its most ancient uses was in the making of helmets. 

 In the course of history it has been used for whips, 

 surgical instruments, for adding gloss to certain kinds of 

 cloth, for umbrella frames, and in countless other ways, 

 not forgetting the use which its name immediately sug- 

 gests : for those compressive devices of the late nineteenth 

 and early twentieth centuries which kept the feminine 

 figure within fashionable limits. 



The tongue of a whale, which it manipulates so eflii- 

 ciently in association with its enormous strainer, is the 

 greatest of all tongues — those of whale sharks, elephants 

 and all other big animals are insignificant appendages 

 compared with it. 



A whale killed in 1932, which weighed 119 tons and 

 was 89 feet in length was found to have a tongue weigh- 

 ing 3 tons 3 cwts. 



Although the general form of the whale is fish-like, we 

 have only to consider the characteristics of fishes — in all 

 their diversified forms, sizes and colours — to realize that 

 it is not a fish but a mammal. It is as much a mammal as 

 a horse, a cow, or man himself. It is in fact a mammal 



216 



