Rorquals in Crouch and Thames. 35 



to all concerned. The Burnham dredgermen were not so 

 fortunate in their capture, in the Crouch River, 12th February, 

 1891, of a female specimen 47 feet long.* The Customs 

 authorities asserted their rights, and the whale was put up to 

 public auction. An outsider purchased it for 17 10s., so that 

 the 30 oyster-dredgers' salvage, after much hard work, amounted 

 to a mere pittance for each. By judicious advertisement as a 

 show, the outsider cleared his expenses, and, 'tis said, with a con- 

 siderable margin of profit; but the fishermen sorely grumbled 

 at their labour lost. Nor did matters end here, for the owner 

 of the Royalty appeared on the scene and took law proceedings. f 

 Within a couple of months after, another whale of the same 

 species, and quite as large, was seen at the mouth of the Roach. 

 According to Mr. Fitch, it got partially stranded, but managed 

 to get oft' as the tide rose. 



Still another fully adult example of this species of Rorqual 

 made its appearance on the 27th November, 1899, between the 

 Albert Docks and Barking Creek. Its chief interest lay in its 

 proving to bo a pregnant female. J 



The Common Rorqual is a famous fish-eater (pilchards, 

 herring and cod tribe), as many as 600 and 800 having been 

 found in one's stomach. In the Thames specimen (1859) ex- 

 amination shewed only fragments of medusae and entomostraca. 



* See Essex Nat. V. (1801) and VII. (1893). 



t The skeleton was afterwards exhibited at Burnham and then Southend, and 

 finally deposited in the Grimsby Museum (W. Crouch). Essex Nat. VII. 1893. 



t Since then we have learned further particulars. It seems that after an exciting 

 chase the whale was headed off by a steam-tug, and ran on to a bank on the Woolwich 

 Arsenal shore. Afterwards the dead body was taken over the river and beached 

 on the North Woolwich shore, close to the steam-ferry jetty. Here for a few days crowds 

 of sight-seers, visited it, the interest increasing on a post obit parturition. Before 

 long the London County Council ordered removal of the mother's carcass, and it was 

 towed down to Price's Oil works, Abbeyville, and there boiled up. After the parent's 

 death the gas generated had evidently caused expulsion of a pair of young whales, 

 in a very advanced condition. One of these mysteriously disappeared, the other 

 was purchased by Mr. White, landlord of the Pavilion Hotel, North Woolwich. This 

 he exhibited in a tent in the grounds behind, facing the river, and by a very judicious 

 use of creosote, obtained from the Beckton Gas-works, he managed to keep the 

 juvenile whale on show for about three months. The Officer of Health visited daily, but 

 could make no complaints on the score of its being a nuisance. Mr. White showed me 

 the receipt for 40 which he presented to the Woolwich Town subscription to the 

 Mansion House War Fund, and he reckoned his own profit on the transaction at as 

 much or more. According to Mr. White, the young whale measured 10 feet 9 inches 

 long. A County Council otticial reported the adult female as 66 feet long ; but it may 

 have been rather less, thetape, we understand, following the course of the body. (J.M.) 



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