250 HISTORY AND DETAILS OF WHALING. 



Sperm oil, 80,941 bbls. 



Eight whale oH, 197,890 bbls. 



Whalebone, 2,592,700 lbs. 



CHAPTER II. 



The Whale. — Its Zoology. — The largest known Animal. — Sperm Whale. 

 — Right Whale. — Finback. — Bovvhead. 



The "Whale is the general name of an order of animals in- 

 habiting the ocean, arranged in zoology under the name of 

 Cete, or Cetacce, and belonging to the class Mammalia in the 

 Linnsean system. This animal is named -whale from round- 

 ness, or from rolling. 



"While living in part or wholly in the ocean, it differs in 

 many important respects from the fish tribes, and it is these 

 peculiarities which render it a link between the creature of . 

 the land and of the sea. While it has the power of locomo- 

 tion in the water, like other fishes, yet in other particulars it 

 has no affinity with them ; it is as much a mammal as the 

 ox, or the elephant, or the horse — having warm blood, breath- 

 ing air, bringing forth living young, and suckling them with 

 true milk." 



The whale is the largest of all known animals. Some re- 

 marks upon the whale and its varieties will form the subject 

 of the present chapter. 



1. The Sperm "Whale. The Cachalot, or Physeter Maero- 

 cephahcs. The principal species are the black-headed, with a 

 dorsal fin, and the round-headed, without a fin on the back, and 

 with fistula in the snout. This whale is known at a distance by 

 the peculiarity of his "spoutings" or "blows." He can be 

 easily detected by whalemen, if he happens to be in company 



