BIGHT WHALE OF THE NORTH-WESTERN COAST. 67 
the Bay of San Sebastian Viscaino, and about Cedros or Cerros Island, both places 
being near the parallel of 29° north latitude ; while on the North-western Coast 
they are captured by the whalers from April to September, inclusive. The Balcena 
Sieboldii is regarded as being a distinct species from the southern Right Whale, and 
is universally known, by American whalemen, as the "North-west Whale." This 
distinguished baleen animal of the north, in its geographical distribution, ranges to 
the Japan Sea and Gulf of Tartary ; but how many species or varieties are included 
under this name is not within our province to decide. Our observations, however, 
make it certain that there is a "scrag" Right Whale in the North Pacific which 
corresponds very nearly to that of the southern ocean, known under the technical 
name of Balcena gibbosa? and which yields a paltry amount of oil. 
The time of gestation with the Balcena Sieboldii is not known, but is supposed 
to be nearly one year ; the dam usually producing but one young at a birth, 
although, in some instances, twins have been observed. The new-born "sucker" 
is about one -fourth the length of the parent animal, which relative proportions are 
approximately uniform in all the whalebone whales which we have had the oppor- 
tunity of examining. It has ever been a matter of mysterious conjecture with the 
most philosophical whalemen, where the northern Right Whales go to bring forth 
their young, and whither they migrate during the winter months. That they do 
not go into the southern hemisphere is well known, and it is equally certain that 
but a few stragglers, even, reach within a number of degrees of the northern tropic 
in their wanderings. The Esquimaux about the north-western shores of Behring 
Sea speak about the Balcena mysticetus resorting to the bays when the "small ice 
comes," and they look forward to that season as a time of plenty, and reap a kind 
of marine harvest by catching numbers of them, thus securing an abundant supply 
of food for winter store. It seems, therefore, beyond question, that the mysticetus 
is quite at home in that region at the beginning of the Arctic winter, and the 
immense numbers of Bowheads and Right Whales that would necessarily appear in 
the temperate latitudes, if they migrated southward, would be sure to arrest the 
attention of passing navigators, who frequently go far north, even in the winter 
season, to make their passages from China and Japan. Some have asserted that 
these animals probably congregate around the borders of the drifting or field ice, 
which joins the open water of the Pacific about the Kurile and Aleutian Islands. 
All agree that they do not pass the tropics and reach the southern ocean. The 
southern Right Whales resort to the bays in that region to bring forth their young, 
and formerly were sought for in the inland waters of those high southern latitudes, 
where many a ship quickly completed her cargo by bay -whaling. But no bay has 
