IN DIFFERENT ANIMALS. 597 



enormous Animal has been estimated at 140,000 

 Ibs. ; and it has been said that, when of the 

 largest size, it has afforded above 20,000 Ibs. of 

 oil. We have no accurate information in regard 

 to the weight of the brain in the sperm whale, 

 which measures eighty-four feet in length, and is 

 larger than the Balena Mysticetus. But Mr. Beale 

 states, that the cranial cavity of one fifty-eight feet 

 six inches long, measured fourteen inches in width, 

 ten inches in length, and^ nine inches in depth 

 that the spinal canal, which is of a triangular 

 form, measured ten inches in width at the base, 

 where connected with the brain, and eight inches 

 in depth ; but only seven inches wide, and six and 

 a half deep at the seventh dorsal vertebra, from 

 which it diminished to the termination.* 



Should it be urged that the brain of the ele- 



* The most remarkable fact connected with the natural history 

 of the cetacea is, the length of time they are capable of remaining 

 under water. Mr. Beale says, that the male sperm whale con- 

 tinues below the surface from one hour to seventy, and even eighty 

 minutes, when he rises and breathes for ten minutes; but that the 

 female remains only twenty minutes below and four minutes above 

 the surface. (Beale on the Sperm Whale, p. 45.) The means by 

 which they are enabled to effect this, exhibit a striking adaptation 

 to the medium in which they exist, and doubtless depend on the 

 vast amount of blood contained in the numerous convolutions of 

 vessels found in the thoracic and abdominal cavities, as first no- 

 ticed by Hunter, all of which is vitalized during the short time 

 they remain above water, by a rapid process of breathing, and 

 thus prepared to maintain the activity of their functions from 

 twenty to sixty and even eighty minutes, while in search of food 

 in the depths of the ocean. 



