CETACEANS. 147 



appendage to collect or concentrate sound. Nor have 

 the researches of comparative anatomists tended to 

 prove, that whales possess the sense of taste in any 

 perfection. To this apparent obtuseness of the senses, 

 touch may perhaps be made an exception ; as I shall 

 have occasion to notice more particularly, when on the 

 subject of the structure and function of the skin in the 

 Cachalot, or Sperm Whale. 



Buoyancy in the element they inhabit, is secured to 

 whales by the dense layer of lard, or blubber, deposited 

 in the skin of every species ; as well as by deposits 

 of oil in other parts of their frame, wherever it can be 

 of use to increase surface, and (by its low specific 

 gravity) to diminish proportionate weight; thus en- 

 abling the creature to rise in the water with facility, 

 and to float on the surface without any expenditure of 

 muscular power.* 



A second use, very rationally assigned to the fatty 

 envelope of the whale, is that of protecting the animal 

 from the coldness of the medium it inhabits ; but we 

 must feel satisfied that this is not its only, or its 

 principal use, when we contemplate the large quantity 

 of oily matter which pervades the skeleton of every 

 species of cetacean ; (and which is often deposited in 

 cells, in the heavier or larger bones;) the internal 

 reservoirs of the same light material in the head of the 

 Sperm Whale and Dolphin ; and the solid bulk of fat 

 which forms so large a portion of the head of the first- 

 named cetacean, as well as the lips of the Greenland 



* An economy very similar to this, obtains also in birds. The greater 

 number have air diffused within their bones and soft parts, in sufficient 

 quantity to enable them to support themselves, with but little muscular 

 effort, in the light element through which they soar ; whilst others, as 

 penguins, of aquatic habits, and which do not fly, have their bones solid, 

 or loaded with oil. 



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