THE HUMPBACK WHALE. 
43 
The following observations were made along the coasts of North and South 
America, and in Oceanica. In the years 1852 and 1853, large numbers of Hump- 
backs resorted to the Gulf of Guayaquil, coast of Peru, to calve, and the height 
of the season was during the months of July and August. The same may be said 
of the gulfs and bays situated near the corresponding latitudes north of the equa- 
tor ; still, instances are not unfrequent where cows and their calves have been seen 
at all other seasons of the year about the same coast. In the Bay of Valle de 
Banderas, coast of Mexico (latitude 20° 30'), in the month of December, we saw 
numbers of Humpbacks, with calves but a few da}^s old. In May, 1855, at Mag- 
dalena Bay, coast of Lower California (about latitude 24° 30'), we found them in 
like numbers ; some with very large calves, while others were very small. The 
season at Tongataboo (one of the Friendly Islands, latitude 21° south, longitude 
174° west), according to Captain Beckerman, includes August and September. Here 
the females were usually large, yielding an average of forty barrels of oil, including 
the entrail fat, which amounted to about six barrels. The largest whale taken at 
this point, during the season of 1871, produced seventy -three barrels, and she was 
adjudged to be seventy -five feet in length. It is worthy of remark, that a large 
majority of the whales resorting thither were white on the under side of the body 
and fins.* 
* Eminent zoologists have divided the Hump- 
backs into several species. Gray, in his Cata- 
logue of the British Museum, 1850, makes mention 
of the following names and outward descrip- 
tions : 
1. Megaptera eonghiana (Johnston's Humpback 
Whale). — Black, pectoral fins and beneath white, 
black varied; lower lip with two series of tu- 
bercles ; pectorals nearly one - third the enth-e 
length ; dorsal elongate, the front edge over 
end of pectoral; throat and belly grooved. Fe- 
male : upper and lower lip with a series of 
tubercles ; dorsal an obscure protuberance. 
2. Megaptera Americana (Bermuda Hump- 
back). — Black, belly white; head with round tu- 
bercles. 
3. Megaptera Poeskop (Poeskop or Cape Hump- 
back). — Dorsal nearly over the end of pectorals. 
4. Megaptera Kuzira ( The Eazira). — Dorsal 
small, and behind the middle of the back; the 
pectoral fins rather short, and less than one- 
fourth the entire length of the body; nose and 
sides of throat have round warts ; belly plaited. 
We have frequently recognized, upon the 
California coast, every species here described, 
and even in the same school or "gam." More- 
over, we have experienced the greatest difficulty 
in finding any two of these strange animals 
externally alike, or possessing any marked gen- 
eric or specific differences. If the differences 
pointed out as constituting different species are 
maintained, we conclude there must be a great 
number. We have observed, both in the dead 
and living animals, the following different ex- 
ternal marks : 1 st. Body black above, white 
beneath. 2d. Body black above and below, with 
more or less white mottling under the throat 
and about the abdomen ; pectoral and caudal 
fins white beneath, or slightly spotted with 
black. 3d. Body black above, white beneath, 
