ORDER VI. THE CETACEA. 259 



a timid and harmless animal. Dolphins and porpoises sometimes sport among 

 them, often leaping, in tlieir wild glee, completely over the backs of these 

 luige leviathans, in which case the latter ap^iear to be thrown into a state of 

 extreme- perplexity and fear. Experienced and intelligent whalers affirm 

 that this species never, in the first instance, attacks a boat designedly ; but 

 if, in its efforts to escape its pursuers, it riuis its head against one, it instinc- 

 tively^ crushes it in its ponderous jaws ; and here we perceive a curious fact, 

 wliicii reveals a considerable power of reflection in the animal. It evidently 

 reasons on the incident, and comes to a decided ^conclusion, as after this the 

 whale becomes a most formidable foe. It has learned that its most relentless 

 enemy is himself vulnerable ; and woo to the whale-boat that shall place itself 

 in tlic way of one that has made this disco\ery. It will rush upon it in fury, 

 and smash it with its powerful jaw, and in like manner will attack and de- 

 stroy any boats that afterwards expose themselves to its wrath ; and thus it 

 is the part of prudence to avoid the creatiire after it has acipiired this 

 knowledge of its strength, and how it may be employed against its perse- 

 cutors. 



Although these whales delight in the vast deserts of the unfathomable 

 ocean far away from land, there are certain seasons when they arc found in 

 great herds near coasts were the shores are steep and the waters are of suf- 

 ficient depth, as New Guinea, New Iceland, New Britain, King's Mill Group, 

 Byron's Island; equinoctial line from longitude liiso to 1750 cast; Ellis 

 Group ; off the east coast of Xew Zealand and the Navigator's Islands ; coast 

 of California, Chili, and Peru; the Gallipagos ; the Moluccas; Straits of 

 Timor ; the Mozambique Channel ; off Japan and the China Seas, and the 

 Loochoo Islands. Some of the proceedings of the cachalot, when on sound- 

 ings, are extremely curious, and not easily explained. Equally curious and 

 unaccountable is the peculiar noise they make beneath the surface — a sound 

 resembling that produced by shaking violently a thin plate or sheet of copper. 

 The sailors describe it as a kind of spiittcritifj, which usually occuis when 

 the animal is alarmed or excited. "We are inclined to believe that these 

 sounds arc the whale's language, by which it conuiuuiicates with its fellows 

 in times of danger ; but we hesitate to hazard the suggestion that this lan- 

 guage is the means by which these animals warn each other of perils when 

 separated by miles. 



Genus Narwiialus. This tribe of the whale family lias no teeth, but 

 instead two long and pointed tusks, called horns, springing from the in- 

 termaxillary bones, and directed forward in the axis of the body ; it has no 

 dorsal fin. The only species known is tliat described below, although An- 

 derson, Laccpcde, and Desmarct describe tla-ee, since ascertained to be 

 merelv creatures of the imaiiination. 



