62 THE WHALEBONE WHALES OF THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC. 



schooners principally on the west and south coasts of the island, from March 



to July." 



" On the Californiau coast there are about a half dozen whaling stations. 

 From these a constant watch is kept, and if a whale is in sight, row boats go out 

 to fish. These stations are at Puuta Bauda and at Santo Tomas in Lower Cali- 

 fornia, and in American territory at Ballast Point, at Monterey, at Pigeon Point, 

 and 1 or 2 in Mendocino County. The whales caught on the Californian coast 

 are mostly Gray whales (Graybacks), which ai'e difficult to cat(di and not very lich 

 in oil ; often half of the whales killed aie lost. The best fishing is from Novem- 

 ber to February, at the time when the whales approach the land at the south. 

 From May to Octobei- their course is northward somewhat fuilher out at sea." 



In 1882 Di'. J. A. Allen published a valuable bibliography of cetology fi'om 

 1495 to 1840,' with critical annotations, and references to the pages on which the 

 names of species and general cetological matter occur. This important guide to 

 cetological literature contains numerous titles of works whose subject-matter is 

 lai'gely or wholly American. 



In 1883 Dr. J. B. Holder, of the American Museum of Natural History, })ub- 

 lished a brief but important memoir on the Atlantic Right whales, containing 

 measurements of four American specimens, descriptions of the skeletons and other 

 data, together with several figures of the exterior, whalebone, skulls, vertebrae, etc. 

 It contains also a summaiy of literature I'elating to the Right whales, a synopsis 

 of American and European opinion regai'ding the various nominal species, and a 

 brief bibliography. Too much space is devoted to matters of little consequence, 

 and too small an amount to the descriptions of the specimens examined. In spite 

 of these defects, its value is unquestionable, es})ecially as it is the on]j paper on 

 Right whales from the east coast of the United States, with compaiative meas- 

 urements and details, and good illustiations, which has thus far been pul)lished.'^ 

 One of the specimens mentioned by Dr. Holder was a skeleton prepai'ed by Di-. G. 

 E. Maiiigault, curator of the Charleston College Museum, Chai'leston, S. C. A 

 little later, in 1885, Dr. Manigault gave a fuller description of this specimen in a 

 paper entitled "The Black Whale Captured in Charleston Harbor, January, 1880." ^ 



Malm's account of bones of whales collected t»y the Veffa Expedition of 

 1878-80^ contains numerous woodcuts of portions of skulls of Hhacldanectes and 

 of other bones of the skeleton of that whale, with detailed descrij^tions. 



In 1884 Dr. G. Brown Goode summed up i)rietly the more important facts 

 regarding baleen and other whales in American waters, adding some new data.^ 



Flower's list of Cetacea in the British Museum, published in 1885,'' contains 



' Allen, J. A., Preliminary List of Works and Papers relating to the Mammalian Orders Cete 

 and Sirenia. Bui/. U. S. Geol. and Geog. Survey of the Territories, 6, No. 3, 1882, pp. 399-562. 



" Holder, J. B., The Atlantic Right Whales. Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., i, 1883, pp. 99-137, 

 pis. 10-13. ' Proc. Elliott Soc. 0/ South Carolina, 1885, pp. 98-104. 



' Malm, A. W., Skelettdelar af Hval insamlade under Expeditionen med Vega 1878- 1880. 

 Bihang, Svensk. Vets. Akad. Handl., 8, No. 4, 1883. 



'Goode, G. B., The Whales and Porpoises. Fisheries and Fishery Indust. of the U. S., Sect, i, 

 Te.xt, 1884, pp. 7-32. 



' Flower, W. H., List of the Specimens of Cetacea in the British Museum. 1885. 



