GREAT NORTHERN RORQUAL. 127 



more restless, and its conduct bolder ; in its blowing 

 being more violent, and its baleen being much shorter 

 and less valuable. 



The cause of this last important difference is very 

 plain ; and may be best illustrated by a glance at 

 the accompanying sketches, in which there is a side 

 view, fig. ?^, Plate i. of the head of the Mysticetus, 

 and fig. of the Rorqual. It will at once be 

 seen that the upper jaw of the former is relatively 

 larger and much more curved; the intervening 

 space in both is filled with baleen, which accordingly 

 must be long in the Mysticetus and short in the 

 Rorqual ; the longest laminae seldom measuring four 

 feet. 



In Mr. F. Knox's account of the great Rorqual, 

 which will subsequently be more particularly al- 

 luded to, we read that three hundred and fourteen 

 plates were counted on each side ; and on further 

 examination it was found that these extended 

 mesially (towards the middle line) only about 

 fifteen inches, and were then succeeded by a vast 

 number of smaller plates, which gradually became 

 less and less, till finally they were converted into 

 bristles ; so that, correctly speaking, there were pro- 

 bably not fewer than four or five thousand distinct 

 plates of whalebone. The baleen, when recent, was 

 highly elastic and soft, the fringed edge being as 

 pliable as the hair of the human head, and thus 

 forming a sieve of the most perfect kind. From the 

 same source we also learn, that the posterior arch of 

 the palate was so large that it could admit a man, 



