November 24, 1904] 



NA TURE 



85 



This question is answered, in general, in the affirm- 

 ative, with some reservation as to the possible exist- 

 once of varietal or subspecific differences in the case 

 of the humpback, Megaptera, and the lesser piked 

 whale, Balacnoptcra rostrata, or acutorostrata, as our 

 author, foUowino- Lacepede, prefers to call it. 

 Furthermore, additional evidence is adduced in sup- 

 port of the identity of the North Pacific species with 

 those of the North Atlantic. This conclusion is entirely 

 confirmatory of the views of European naturalists, 

 juid Dr. True's remarks on the distribution of the 

 various forms deserve to be read in connection with 

 Dr. Guldberg's recent very interesting' papers on the 

 probable course of the annual migrations of several 

 species around the circuit of the North .Atlantic. 



But Dr. True has given us other things besides a 

 careful account of specific characters. He has given 

 us, in the first place, a singularly interesting epitome 

 of the early history of whaling in .America, downwards 

 from the m3'thical days of the Saga of Thorfinn. It 

 will be news to the citizens of New York that, in the 

 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, there w.is a not 



Norwegians, which seems to be rare on the other side 

 of the Atlantic, but which in certain years has bulked 

 very largely in the Finmark catch ; lastly, the hump- 

 back, Megaptera. Besides these a sperm whale is 

 caught every now and then, and the Icelanders still 

 take an occasional Nordkaper, or Biscayan whale. 

 Thus the " finner " industry furnishes not only a large 

 number of individuals, but a great variety of species 

 to the observation of the naturalist. Several curious 

 points crop up in regard to the relative commercial 

 value of the several forms. Tlius, for instance, 

 Rudolphi's whale, a species very similar to the common 

 rorqual, long overlooked and afterwards considered 

 very rare by naturalists, is now a most valuable element 

 in the fishery, its whale-bone, though no bigger and 

 longer than that of the common species, being worth, 

 from its intrinsic quality, just about ten times as much. 

 Dr. True's photographs show us, with a wealth of 

 illustration, Sibbald's whale, the common rorqual, the 

 humpback, and the Nordkaper as they lie upon the 

 bi-ach. Many interesting points are excellently well 

 shown — the distribution of colour, the curious pleat- 

 ings of the ventral skin, the con- 

 trast in form between the long, 

 slender, lanky Sibbald's whale 

 and the shorter, stouter body of 

 the common species, the tubercles 

 on the head of Megaptera, the 

 huge flippers with their garniture 

 of barnacles in the same species. 



It is a common practice of 

 -American naturalists, and Dr. 

 True is no exception, to deal 

 somewhat harshly with received 

 nomenclature in the quest after 

 " priority." Rightly or wrongly, 

 the common rorqual is invariably 

 Icnown to us as B. niusctilus, but 

 that name is here transferred to 

 what we call B. sibbaldii ; the 

 former is here designated B. phy- 

 saliis, L., and B. biscayensis 

 figures as B. glacialis, Bonna- 

 terre. The work as a whole does 

 not lend itself to epitomisation, 

 and the foregoing brief account 

 does not do justice to its scientific 

 interest. 



D. W. T. 



-The Humpback, liale 



unimportant whale fisher}- on Long Island and in 

 Delaware Bay, and that so late as 1823 ( ?) there was 

 a family on Long Beach, N.J., who every winter 

 sought for and " sometimes captured " w-hales, in 

 which business they had been engaged, father and 

 sons, ever since the Revolution. In the next place, 

 and of still more popular interest. Dr. True has 

 ♦mriehed his book with fifty large plates, for the most 

 part taken directly from photographs, of whales as 

 they lay on the beach at the Newfoundland factories. 

 .\ few similar photographs have recently appeared 

 from Norwegian and Scottish sources, but no such 

 excellent and comprehensive series as Dr. True's has 

 yet been made, though, bv the way, one series of 

 B. musciilus, published about twenty years ago by 

 M. Yves Delage, could scarcely be surpassed. 



Five or six species of whales are obtained, more or 

 less abundantly, at the various whaling stations. These 

 are the great " sulphur-bottom," or Sibbald's rorqual, 

 the blue whale of the Norwegians, which, rare on our 

 own coasts, is the chief source of profit to the Icelandic 

 and Newfoundland whalers ; secondly, the common 

 rorqual; thirdly, Rudolphi's rorqual, the Seihval of the 



NO. 1830, VOL. 71] 



NOTES. 



The directors of the Ben Nevis Observatories, which were 

 closed on October i, have just issued a circular describing 

 the circumstances in which these observatories have at last 

 been discontinued. The maintenance of the two stations 

 at Fort William and on the summit of Ben Nevis has in- 

 volved an average yearly e.\penditure of 1000!. Of this 

 sum, 350/. has been supplied by the Meteorological Council, 

 and the remainder has been obtained from various private 

 sources. It was hoped that the Treasury Committee which 

 was appointed to consider the question of the annual grant 

 to the Meteorological Council would deal adequately with 

 the position of the Ben Nevis Observatories in its report, 

 but in their circular the directors express disappointment 

 that this was not done. The directors remark : — " Some 

 of their number, including the two secretaries, were ex- 

 amined, and fully stated their case, besides handing in de- 

 tailed memoranda regarding the history, work, and cost 

 of maintenance of the observatories. Yet, with all this 

 information before them, the committee state in their re- 

 port that ' it appears that only 350/. per annum is required 



