[woop] LAURENCIANA 49 
in certain spots. I have seen a run of them go by, uninterruptedly, 
for over an hour, many abreast, all swimming straight ahead and making 
the air tumultuous with the snorts and plunges that accompanied every 
breath. This, however, is rare. You will generally see them at 
their individual best in bright, sunny weather, when their glistening 
white, fish-shaped bodies come curvetting out of the water in all di- 
rections; or when they play follow-my-leader and look like a dazzling 
sea-serpent half-a-mile long. But, in the middle of all this and the cor- 
responding flip-flop game of the seals, you may see both white whales and 
seals streaking away for dear life. And no wonder, for over there is 
that unmistakable dorsal fin, clean-cut and high, jet black and wicked- 
looking, like the flag of the nethermost pirate. It belongs to the 
well-named Killer, the Orca Gladiator of zoology, often miscalled the 
grampus. He is at once the bull-dog, the wolf and the lion of the sea; 
but stronger than any thirty-foot lion, hungrier than a whole pack of 
wolves, readier to fight to the death than any bull-dog, and, with all 
this, of such lightning speed that he can catch the white whale, who 
can overhaul the swiftest seal, who, in his turn, can catch the fastest 
fish that swims. He is the champion fighter and feeder of all creation. 
A dozen fat seals will only whet his appetite for more. With a single 
comrade he will bite the biggest ‘‘right’’ whale to death in no time. 
Ihave known him catch a white whale off Green Island Reef and be away 
again like a flash, gripping it thwartwise in his mouth. Think of a beast 
of prey that can run off with an elephant and still outpace a motor 
boat! Fortunately for the rest of the seafolk the Killer is not 
very plentiful, since he is almost as destructive as civilised man. 
Bigger again than the killer, twice his size at least, is the great fat, 
good-natured humpback, the clown of the sea. On a fine, calm day, 
the humpbacks will gambol to their hearts’ content, lol-lopping about 
on the surface, or shooting up from the depths with a tremendous 
leap that carries their enormous bodies clear out of the water and high 
into the air, and shows the whole of their immense black-and-white- 
striped bellies. Then they turn over forwards, to come down with a 
sumphing smacker that sets the waves rocking and drenches an acre 
or two with flying spray. And last, and biggest of all, bigger than 
any other living creature, is the Greenland whale, the “Right Whale” 
par excellence; and nothing the animal kingdom has to show is so im- 
pressive in its way as to see the waters suddenly parted by his gleaming 
black bulk, which in a moment grows to leviathan proportions before 
your astonished eyes. 
Would you barter the lasting companionship of all this magnificent 
strength for one mess of commercial pottage, especially when it is the 
fitting counterpart to the soaring beauty of the birds? Go out before 
Sec. II., 1910. 4. 
