THE GREENLAND, OR RIGHT WHALE THE HUMP-BACKED WHALE. 



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under the ice. The American whalers on the Okhotsk Sea vary their mode of pursuit according to 

 the district, often landing and even making night whaling expeditions, being guided by the phos- 

 phorescence accompanying the creatures' movements. An ordinary-sized Whale, between forty and 

 fifty feet, will yield, according to Scammon, from sixty to eighty barrels of oil, and 1,000 Ibs. of 

 baleen. The usual manner is for the "Whale to be brought along the port side of the vessel, its tail 

 forwards, belly up, and head aft. Tackled at each extremity, the men with spiked boots 

 commence to strip the blubber, which is hoisted on deck. When the belly and right side 

 with nipper are disposed of, the carcass is canted and the other side is similarly treated. 

 The material is hastily put aside until the first quiet opportunity admits of it being cut in 

 pieces and finally stowed in the holds, where it is kept in perfect safety until the return of 

 the vessel. The skin and waste pieces of flesh or " kreng " are thrown away, and as the 

 carcass and such useless matter are abandoned, they are quickly seized by the Killer Whales, 

 Threshers, and Greenland Sharks, and by enormous numbers of sea-fowl that hover in the 

 wake of the whaler. 



THE HUMP-BACKED WHALES.* Of this genus three, four, or even more species are 

 named by naturalists. The Long-filmed (M. longimana), or Kepokak of the Greenlanders, 

 inhabits the North Atlantic area as far as Davis Sti'ait. A southern form, the Cape 

 Hump-back (M. Lalandii], is distributed over the South Atlantic, also towards both 

 continents. There is a South Pacific form (M. novce zelandice), the New Zealand Hump- 

 back, stretching to the American coast, and still another, the Japanese Hump-back (M. 

 kuzira), which ranges to the Aleutian and Californian coasts. These Whales are by no 

 means as valuable for oil or baleen as the Right Whale, and are not very frequently 

 hunted. An adult averages fifty feet in length. The skin of the throat and belly is plaited 

 longitudinally like corrugated iron with narrow furrows. The flippers are very long, one- 

 thii'd or one-fourth the length o the animal, their edges often undulating. The charac- 

 teristic feature or hump, is a low dorsal fin, situate behind the middle of the body. They 

 have a bulky, stoutish body, and a broad flat head, and the neck vertebrae are usually 

 separate. They are black, occasionally paler below, and some have white flippers, but the 

 baleen is black. Dr. Rink says thab when struck with harpoon, the Kepokak rushes along 

 the surface without diving. They rest lazily near the surface, beating their flippers as if 

 scratching themselves. The Greenlanders steal up to them when asleep, and stab them 

 with lances. All the species, at times, seem to delight in endless springing and dashing out 

 of the water. They will yield from twenty to thirty barrels of oil, and a few hundred- 

 weight of an inferior quality of whalebone. The Hump-back of the Pacific, according to 

 Scammon, proceeds north in summer, and returns southwards on the approach of winter ; 

 but they have been observed with young following them at various times and seasons. 



Considerable interest is attached to another Cetacean of the North Pacific, which Capt. 

 Scammon names the California Grey Whale.t The female of this animal is from forty to HARPOON-. 

 forty-four, and the male seldom more than thirty-five feet in length. In shape it may be said 

 to be somewhat intermediate between the Right Whale, the Hump-backs, and the Rorquals, though in 

 most respects nearest the last two. It has no back fin or hump, but instead a series of cross ridges 

 on the hinder part of the back towards the tail. Occasionally individuals are nearly black, but the 

 more common and characteristic colour is a mottled-grey or speckled patches of white on all the 

 upper parts, underneath being darkest in body-tint. The flippers are fully six feet long, broad in 

 the middle, but taper to a point. The head arches downwards from the blowhole forwards, and the 

 baleen is remarkably short, brownish-white, and coarse in texture. From November till May this 

 Whale frequents the Californian coast, and then the females enter the shallow bays and lagoons, and 

 give birth to their young, while the males keep seawards. During the summer months they all 

 journey northwards along the coast, and congregate amidst the ice in the Arctic Ocean and the 

 Okhotsk Sea. So regular are their migrations, and so close in-shore do they swim, that Eskimo 

 and Indians alike keep watch at the proper season, and as they pass successfully attack them in 

 their canoes. The flukes, lips, and fins form native dainties, the oil is bartered for reindeer, a 



* Megaptera ; u^at, great, and irrepov, fin. t Rhachianectes glaucus of Cope. 



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