CLIO BOREALIS. 71 



seas to maintain such a multitude of voracious an- 

 imals ! The keeper of the "Talking Seal" in Lon- 

 don told me that they "gave her fifty pounds of 

 fish a day, and that she would eat one hundred 

 pounds if she could get it; 11 so we can form some 

 idea of what the thousands of seals here must de- 

 vour. The basis of all this gormandizing is un- 

 doubtedly the Medusa? or Jelly-fish, which in places 

 are so numerous as actually to thicken and discolor 

 the sea ! Conspicuous among these are the small 

 black animalculce, popularly known to the Nor- 

 wegian frequenters of these regions as " Hval- 

 spise" or "Whales' food" (Clio borealis). 



This singular mollusk may be briefly described 

 as nearly resembling the body of a tadpole, but in- 

 stead of the tail of the latter it is provided with a 

 pair of wings like those of a bird, with which it 

 propels itself through the water by a sort of flying 

 motion. The sea is literally blackened in some 

 places by the swarms of these animalculae to such 

 an extent that I have no difficulty in believing 

 that the huge Mysticetus, witli his enormous open 

 mouth and whalebone brushes, may ingulf a suf- 

 ficiency of them to maintain him. I collected a 

 lot of these winged tadpoles, intending to preserve 

 them in spirits of wine, but somehow that fluid re- 

 duced them in a few days to a sort of opaque pulpy 

 mass. While they were waiting in a tumbler for a 

 pickle-bottle to be cleaned and filled with spirits 

 of wine for their reception, they fought furiously 



