112 NATURAL HISTORY. 



enough to take in a body of the size of a man. But one 

 young is produced at a time, and this is about fourteen 

 feet long. The milk of the mother Whale is very much 

 like that of quadrupeds. 



192. Whalebone Whales are as large as the Sperm 

 Whales. There are two species, the Greenland Whale, 

 and the Rorqual. The former is the best known, and 

 is altogether the most valuable, because it furnishes the 

 most blubber and the best whalebone. These whales 

 have no teeth, but instead have a remarkable apparatus 

 for taking their food, which consists of very small sea- 

 animals of various kinds. The whalebone is the frame- 

 work of the food-catching apparatus ; it is in the head, 

 in laminae or plates to the number of three or four hund- 

 red. All of these are fringed with fibres extending down 

 into the mouth. Now, when the Whale feeds, it rushes 

 through the water with its huge mouth wide open, throw- 

 ing out the water that enters the mouth by spouting 

 through the blow-holes. The consequence is, that as the 

 water pass.es through the fringes, the little animals in it 

 are caught by them, and then are swallowed. The 

 throat, in contrast with that of the Sperm Whale, is so 

 narrow, that what an ox could easily swallow would 

 choke this immense animal. 



193. The Dolphin family of the Cetacea includes, be- 

 sides the Porpoise and the Dolphin, many animals ordi- 

 narily called Whales. They all have teeth in greater 

 number than any other Mammals, some of them even 

 over a hundred in each jaw. The Porpoise occurs hi 

 large numbers in all the seas of Europe, and on the coasts 

 of America. It is abundant in our bays and large rivers. 

 Its length is from four to eight feet. It lives on her- 

 rings, mackerel, salmon, etc. It is the .most common and 

 abundant of all the Cetacea. The blubber yields a very 

 fine oil. Its skin is tanned, and the leather is used par- 

 ticularly for the upper leather of boots and shoes. It is 

 amusing to see the Porpoises rise to the surface, and 



