20 VIKINGS OF TO-DAY 



made her escape, leaving a long track of blood 

 behind her." I have fired from my boat at the 

 grampus, but without success. Mr. Mackenzie, of 

 the Hudson Bay Company, however, told me he was 

 once standing up in his small boat, waiting for a 

 seal, when he saw a grampus rising to the surface 

 alongside. As its head emerged from the water, he 

 fired straight at the blow-hole, with the result that 

 the single explosive ball penetrated the animal's 

 brain, and he rolled over dead without a struggle. 

 Not an unfortunate issue as far as the small boat 

 was concerned. 



Pliny speaks of a whale 960 feet long ! Another 

 traveller's license I fear. A hundred feet is, as far 

 as I know, an outside limit. The whale-bone hangs 

 from the roof of the mouth, is short in front and 

 behind, and is at best some six feet long. It is 

 scythe-shaped, and edged with long coarse fibres, 

 which sweep over the huge soft tongue, filtering off 

 the slime on which these whales live. Three hun- 

 dred and fifty pieces are found on each side. 



The narwhale, with his long tusk, eight feet long, 

 with which he pokes up the sea grass on which he 

 feeds, was once common on this coast. Some say 

 he uses the tusk to bore holes through the ice, and 

 so get air to breathe. The tusk is really an incisor 

 tooth, or two incisor teeth enormously prolonged, 

 and twisted round one another. Where no wood is 

 found the Eskimo hang their tents on these ivory 

 rafters. 



