THE WHALEBONE WHALES OF THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC, 39 
BaL&ANAZ DENTATA, 
Dorso levi apinnes. 
1. Cete Clusii Exot. [Not American. ] 
2. Cachelot s. Potfish Zorgdrageri. [ = Sperm whale. ] 
Dorso levi pinnate. 
1. Balena major. [Not American.] 
2. Mular Nierembergit. [Do.] 
3. Linckit. [Do.] 
Dorso gibbo apinnes. 
Dudleji Balena. { = Sperma Ceti whale of Dudley. ] 
Dorso gibbo pinnate. 
Balena, Tigridis instar, variegata. 
In 1741 appeared the first edition of Egede’s Description of Greenland. Egede 
was for twenty-five years a missionary in that country and must have had many 
opportunities for obtaining information regarding whales. He mentions and briefly 
describes various cetaceans, including “ the Whale” (Bowhead), the “ Finned whale” 
or “ Fin-Fish,” the “ Nord Caper,” and the “Cachelot.” The matter relating to the 
“Nord Caper” appears to have been extracted from some earlier author, but the 
remainder is original. It is for the most part accurate, and is of interest on account 
of the frequency with which it is quoted by later writers.’ 
In 1746 John Anderson, burgomeister of Hamburg, a scholarly writer and 
painstaking naturalist, published an excellent résumé of what was then known of 
whales in northern waters, in his Nachrichten von Island, Grénland und der 
Strasse Davis.” He appears not to have acquired any knowledge of the natural his- 
tory of the cetaceans by direct observation, but diligently pursued inquiries among 
the whalers and fishermen who came to Hamburg. He took every opportunity to 
examine the treasures in the various European museums then established, and as- 
sembled a natural history cabinet of his own. 
In the course of his essay on Greenland and Davis Strait, Anderson stops to 
consider the cetaceans. He includes and comments on the various species mentioned 
by Paul Dudley in 1725, and the earlier anonymous writer in the Philosophical 
Transactions. His classification and the species of whalebone whales mentioned 
are as follows: 
Genus Cetaceum. 
(1) Whales with blowholes. 
(2) Whales with nostrils.* 
Or, 
(1) Whales with smooth backs. [=Balenine.| 
(az) The true whale, or Greenland Right whale. [= Ba/ena mysticetus. | 
(4) The Nordcaper. [=J. glacéalis or biscayensis.] 
(2) Whales with the back grown out. [= Balenopterine. | 
* Ecepr, H., A Description of Greenland. ‘Translated from the Danish. London, 1745, pp. 
65-82, pls.5 and 6. I have not seen the original edition. * Hamburg, 1746, pp. 95-103, 185-230. 
* Anderson comments on the fact that the Greenland whalemen have not seen any of the 
second class, and states that he would disbelieve in their existence but for Sibbald’s observations. 
Sibbald, however, while speaking of nostrils really describes the blowholes, having apparently be- 
come confused between the simple blowhole of the toothed whales and the double one of the whale- 
bone whales. 
