THE ''SPOUTING'' OF WHALES. 63 



themselves with diligent compilation, and thus copied and 

 transmitted the errors of their predecessors, with the 

 addition of some slight embellishments of their own. Ac- 

 cordingly, we find Olaus Magnus * describing, as follows, 

 the Physeter, or, as his translator, Streater, calls it, the 

 Whirlpool. " The PJiyscter or Pristis," he says, " is a kind 

 of whale, two hundred cubits long, and is very cruel. For, 

 to the danger of seamen, he will sometimes raise himself 

 above the sail-yards, and casts such floods of waters above 

 his head, which he had sucked in, that with a cloud of them 

 he will often sink the strongest ships, or expose the mariners 

 to extreme danger. This beast hath also a large round 

 mouth, like a lamprey, whereby he sucks in his meat or 

 water, and by his weight cast upon the fore or hinder deck, 

 he sinks and drowns a ship." 



Figures 24 and 25 (p. 64) are facsimiles of the illustrations 

 which accompany the above description. It will be seen 

 that, in the first, the Physeter is depicted as uprearing a 

 maned neck and head, like that of a fabled dragon ; whilst 

 in Fig. 25 it is shown as a whale flinging itself on board a 

 ship, which is sinking under its ponderous weight. In 

 both, torrents of water are issuing from its head, and it is 

 evident that they are merely exaggerated misrepresenta- 

 tions of the " spouting " of whales. 



Gesner copies many of Olaus Magnus's illustrations, and 

 improves upon Fig. 25 by putting a numerous crew on 

 board the ship. The unfortunate sailors are depicted in 

 every attitude of terror and despair, and seem to be in- 

 capacitated from any attempt to save themselves by the 

 flood of water which the whale is deliberately pouring upon 

 them from its blow-holes. 



* ' Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' lib. xxi. cap. vi. a.d. 

 I55S- 



