284 The Oceanographical Museum at Monaco 



pods which it has swallowed, for these are the invariable and 

 characteristic ingredient of all genuine ambergrise. He further 

 states that the whalers are convinced that the cachalot feeds 

 only on squids, which, when unmutilated, must be of great si/r. 

 One whaler reported a case where the whale in its death-thror 

 rendered a single tentacle, which, though incomplete from having 

 been partially digested, still measured 27 feet in length, and he 

 held that this justifies the common saying of the whalers that 

 the squids are the biggest fish in the sea. 



The work of the Prince amongst the toothed Cetaceans has 



5. The principal fragments of Lepidnienlhi's Cirimuldii Joubain. 



had an interesting sentimental result. The combat of the 

 "thrasher" and the whale, so dear to the nautical mind, seems 

 to be nothing but the violent and desperate resistance of the 

 giant squid to being swallowed when brought to the surface 

 by the cachalot. 



The whalebone whale, shown in Fig. 6, was struck by the 

 Prince in May, 1896, not many miles from Monaco, but it escaped. 

 Its carcase was washed ashore in September of the same year, 

 near Pietra Ligure, on the Italian Riviera. A remarkable feature 

 of this skeleton is the evidence of fracture and repair of a number 

 of ribs on its left side. This has been ascribed to collision with 



