Apparatus and Methods of Capture. 95 
In the early days of whaling, in fact for many years 
after deep-sea whaling was begun, both the trying out of 
oil from the blubber and the refining was done on shore. 
Later trying out was done on board the vessels and the 
oil was brought back ready for the refineries. In the 
refining processes the oil is first heated to makc the 
pieces of blubber and foreign matter settle. The clear 
oil is then subjected to a freezing process which partly 
granulates it. The freezing is followed by straining 
through cloths and subjection to pressure to separate the 
solid matter or ‘‘foots’’—spermaceti from sperm oil and 
whale’s foot from whale oil. The various grades of oil 
are then obtained by heating, pressing and the addition 
of chemicals to clarify and bleach them. Oils for deli- 
cate mechanisms, as for watches and clocks, are com- 
monly made from porpoise jaw and blackfish head oils, 
the process of refining these oils requiring about two 
years." 
The spermaceti representing the “‘foot”’ of sperm oil is 
carefully separated and subjected to processes of refin- 
ing by itself. In its final form it appears as a white, 
translucent crystalline mass**—which in the manufacture 
of sperm candles was usually mixed with beeswax to 
prevent granulation. 
Whalebone is now the most important product of the 
whale fishery. It comes from the baleen or right whale, 
or from the rorqual, more commonly known as the “sul- 
phur bottom.’’ The bone occurs as a series of plates or 
blades, several hundred in number, and varying up to 
fifteen feet in length, which are suspended from the sides 
of the crown bone and hang down on each side of the 
tongue. The value of the bone lies in the fact that when 
softened with hot water, or by heating before a fire, it has 
the property of retaining any given shape, provided it is 
5! Ellis, p. 470. 
*? Simmonds, p. 389-390. 
