54 WHALES AND WHALERS. [PART r 



founded. If we may judge from analogy of fishes, 

 birds, and the whole class of mammiferous animals, 

 the assertion must be untrue ; and this view is con- 

 firmed by the testimony of those who carry on the 

 fishery from ships, that, instead of the whales being 

 fatter during that time, the contrary is the case, 

 and that the average result of the fishing on the 

 whaling-grounds exceeds that of the coast fisheries. 

 I have also heard that very often cows have been 

 brought into Te-awa-iti which were remarkably lean, 

 and did not yield more than five or six tuns of oil. 

 We must also expect the oil from whales in the 

 period of gestation to be inferior in quality, from 

 the great change which then is effected in all the 

 solid and fluid elements of the body. 1 



Whilst I am thus pleading the cause of the 

 whale, I am well aware that the most effective mode 

 of preserving the fishery would be to spare the cows 

 and calves altogether, and to kill merely the bulls. 

 The whalers can distinguish at a considerable dis- 

 tance a bull from a cow ; the elevation near the 

 spout-holes, called the top-knot, being much higher 

 in the bulls, and this part is always above the 

 water ; but such an extensive protection is probably 

 impracticable. 



It would suffice if, during the winter season, or 



1 From a recent report of a captain of the royal navy of France 

 it appears that the New Zealand whaling in this year (1842) has 

 been entirely unsuccessful, and that most of the whalers are begin- 

 ning to cruise on the north-west coast of America. 



