108 VOYAGE JNTO 



the fish might be made something, as the Sjianiards do out 

 of the wikl Scmpertwc aloes (by them called Savild) ; they 

 prepare it like flax or hemp, and so make packthread, cloths, 

 and the like manvifactures of it.^ 



To cut the whalebones out is also a peculiar trade, and 

 abundance of iron tools belong thereunto. The lower part 

 of the whale's mouth is commonly white : the tongue lyeth 

 amongst the whalebones ; it is very close tyed to the under- 

 most chap or lip ; it is very large and white, with black 

 spots at the edges. It is a soft spongy fat, which cannot 

 easily be cut ; it makes a great deal of work to the cutter 

 (for so they call the man that doth cut the fat into small 

 pieces with a large knife, which cannot be well done with 

 other knifes, because it is tough and soft), wherefore they 

 fling the tongue away, else they might get five, six, or seven 

 barrels of train-oyl out of it ; but as I said before, they fling 

 it away because of its softness ; and this is the most pleasing 

 food for the sioord-Jish. Upon his head is the hovel or 

 bump before the eyes and Anns : at the top of this bump on 

 each side, is a spout-hole, two over-against one another, 

 which are bended on each side like an S, or as the hole that 

 is cut on a violin, whereovit he doth blow the water very 

 fiercely, that it roars like a hollow wind which we hear when 

 the wind bloweth into a cave, or against the corner of a 

 board, or like an organ-pipe. This may be heard at a league's 

 distance, although you do not see him by reason of the thick 

 and foggy air. The whale bloweth or spouts the water fiercest 

 of all when he is wounded, then it sounds as the roaring of 

 the sea in a great storm, and as we hear the wind in a very 

 hard storm. Behind this bump the tohale is somewhat more 

 bended in than \\\e Jinn-fish, yet when they swim you cannot 

 well discern one from the other, except you observe it very 

 exactly, for it is only the finn on the Ji/ui-fishe's back, that 



^ See Dr. Gray's " Catalogue of Cetacea in tlie British Museum," pp. 

 10, 11, 12, for much valuable information on whalebone. 



