THE WHALEBONE WHALES OF THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC. 61 



" Pi'of. Cope mentioned the captiu-e of a young Balwiia cimrdica, of 48 feet 

 in length, in the Puiritan Rivei', near South Auibo}-, on May 30th. The skeleton 

 was buned and would be preserved in some museum. He examined the whalebone, 

 of which there are 245 laminje on each side of the mouth. The color is bla(;k and 

 theiiair is fine, long, and has a brownish tinge; length of longest i)late with hair, 

 48 inches. The gum is 116 inches long and 11 inches deep. He was informed 

 that the whale was entirely black, and the dorsal line without irregularities." ' 



The Greenland Manual, edited by T. Rupert Jones, and publish.-d in 1875, 

 contains a revised edition of Dr. Robert Brown's excellent paper on the Cetacea of 

 Greenland." His remarks i-egarding the Finbacks and Humpback, thou<;h brief, 

 are of considerable importance. 



Dr. Moritz Lindeman published in 1880 an excellent treatise on sea fisheries,'^ 

 in which he gives a brief account of the whale fisheries carried on in various parts 

 of the world. Especially interesting in the pi'esent connection are the statements 

 regarding the Humpback fishery in the West Indies,^ and the Gray-whale fishery 

 on the coast of California.'^ They may properly be presented here in translation : 



"Mr. Archer, who for 14 years fitted out boats for whale fishinf,^, leports as 

 follows regarding the whale fishery about the Barbadoes: '1 find that heie the 

 whales have not grown scarcer, and that they are not more shy and more difficult 

 to catch than formerly. . . . Sperm whales are not found heie, but are some- 

 times caught about the Leeward Islands. The baleen of the Humpback is from 

 3 to 5 feet long. It is to be remarked that this year the cai-casses of the whales 

 have begun to be used for manure. The capture of the 'Buckelwal' {Balcfna 

 hoo2)s. English, Humpback) is carried on in the central part of the islands on the 

 lee side, with boats sent out fi'om shoi-e, where the dead fish are drawn out and 

 where the oil is extracted. The Humpback has a length of from 50 to 60 feet, 

 and furnishes 50 to 70 barrels of oil. In the fishing season four boats go out 

 whaling everyday, each with 7 men; two boats go toward the North and two 

 toward the South. The whales appear in January, and leave in June; the fishing, 

 howevei', begins generally in March, as they fiist appeal- in larger numbers at this 

 time. The fishing is cpiite easy if only females with their young appear, more 

 difficult if the males also come in, as the latter keep a good watch.' . . . The 

 females nurse their young in quiet water on the coast and one can, according to Mr. 

 Archer, observe the young nursing very well in clear, but not dee[>, watei-. 



"Fishing for Humj)backs takes place in the Grenada Ids. in spring and 

 early summer, and 500-800 bai-rels of oil, worth £1500-2000, are obtained 

 annually. 



"At Tobao-o the whale fishery is carried on by American vessels, with fair 

 results. 



" The whale fishery [at Santa Lucia Iil] is carried on by 1 or 2 American 



' Froc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1874, p. 89. 



' Brown, Roht., On the History and Geographical Relations of the Cetacea frequenting Davis 

 Strait and Balfin's Bay. Manual of Greenland, T. R. Jones, Editor, 1875, pp. 69-93. K-eprinted, 

 with correclions and annotations, from Proc. Zodl. Soc. London, 1868, pp. 533-556. 



' Lindeman, M , Die Seefischereien. Petermanns Mittheil. Ergdnzungsheft, No. 60, 1880. 



' Op. cit., pp. S4-86. 



' Op. cit., pp. 66-67. 



