xv BALEEN OR WHALEBONE 221 



these whales is not yet known with certainty. They have 

 been seen apparently seeking for it along soft bottoms of the 

 sea, and fuci and mussels have been found in their stomachs. 



In the Greenland right whale of the circumpolar seas, the 

 bowhead of the American whalers (JSalcena mysticetus, Fig. 9, 

 p. 195), all the peculiarities which distinguish the head and 

 mouth of the whales from other mammals have attained their 

 greatest development. The head is of enormous size, exceed- 

 ing one-third of the whole length of the creature. The cavity 

 of the mouth is actually larger than that of the body, thorax 

 and abdomen together. The upper jaw is very narrow, but 

 greatly arched from before backwards, to increase the height 

 of the cavity and allow for the great length of the baleen, 

 the enormous rami of the mandibles are widely separated 

 posteriorly, and have a still further outward sweep before 

 they meet at the symphysis in front, giving the floor of the 

 mouth the shape of an immense spoon. The baleen blades 

 attain the number of 350 or more on each side, and those in 

 the middle of the series have a length of ten or even twelve 

 feet. They are black in colour, fine and highly elastic in 

 texture, and fray out at the inner edge and ends into long, 

 delicate, soft, almost silky, but very tough hairs. 



How these immensely long blades depending vertically 

 from the palate were packed into a mouth the height of 

 which was scarcely more than half their length was a mystery 

 not solved until a ifew years ago. Captain David Gray, of 

 Peterhead, at my request, first gave us a clear idea of the 

 arrangement of the baleen in the Greenland whale, and showed 

 that the purpose of its wonderful elasticity was not primarily 

 at least the benefit of the corset and umbrella makers, but 

 that it was essential for the correct performance of its 

 functions. It may here be mentioned that the modification 

 of the mouth structure of the right whale is entirely in relation 

 to the nature of its food. It is by this apparatus that it is 

 enabled to avail itself of the minute but highly nutritious 

 crustaceans and pteropods which swarm in immense shoals in 

 the seas it frequents. The large mouth enables it to take in 

 at one time a sufficient quantity of water filled with these 

 small organisms, and the length and delicate structure of the 



