Delphinid^.- 



-MAMMALU.- 



-Delphinid.e. 



203 



Lacepede, the French naturaUst afterwards carelessly 

 stated in liis well-kno\vn work that the specimen was 

 captured at Boston in America ; and Jlr. Shaw in his 

 " British Miscellany," actually represented this cele- 

 brated Lincolnshire specimen, with two fully developed 

 teeth ! Strange errors ! 



THE NORTHERN BELUGA {Behir/a Catodon) or 

 Wliite whale, derives its name from tlie uniformly 

 white colour of the skin. It is an inhabitant of the 

 nortliern seas generally, being especially nimierous off 

 the coast of Greenland, in Hudson's Bay and Davis 

 Strait. The Northern Beluga forms a very strildng 

 object, and is remarkable for its elegant symmetry and 

 activity. According to Scoresby it is not at all shy, 

 but often follows ships, herding in numbers to the 

 extent of forty or iifty individuals, which are seen 

 gracefully tumbling above and below the ocean's sur- 

 face. Two examples have been captured off the 

 British coast. One of these was seen in the Mcdway 

 as recently as 1846, and it was subsequently shot near 

 Upnor castle. It measured rather more than thirteen 

 feet in length. The other was killed in the Frith of 

 Forth, near Stirling, on the 6th June 1815. A fidl 

 account of this specimen (tig. 80) is given by Dr. Bar- 



clay and Mr. Neil in the third volume of the Wemerian 

 Society's Transactions, and the skin may be seen, beau- 

 tifully preserved, in tlie Natural History Museum of the 

 Edinburgh University. On tlie autliority of Jlr. Bald 

 of Alloa, Mr. Neill informs us, " that the animal gene- 

 rally passed upwards when the tide was llowing, and 

 returned do'ivn the frith ^vith the ebb ; this sometimes 

 happened every day, and sometimes once in two or 

 three days; it came frequently to the surface, and was 

 well known for about tliree months by the name of the 

 white whale. It was supposed to run up the river in 

 pursuit of salmon, and it was at last killed by the sal- 

 mon-fishers, near the Abbey of Cambuskenncth. The 

 animal had been attacked both with tire-arms and 

 spears," and Dr. Barclay found one of the musket balls 

 in the lungs. It was a male specimen, and measured 

 thirteen feet four inches in length. The flesh of the 

 Beluga is considered good eating by the Greenlanders, 

 whilst the oil is still more highly extolled. Neither the 

 male nor the female exliibit any dorsal tin. The dam 

 usually produces two young at a birth, tlie suckers 

 having at first a bluish-gi-ey colour. The e.\ample shot 

 in the INIedway was furnislied with thirty-six teeth; 

 twenty in the npjier, and sixteen in the lower jaw; but 



Fig. so. 



The Northera Beluga (Beluga Catodon) 



it would seem that the teeth of the upper jaw are deci- 

 duous in old indi\ iduals. In the Eldinljurgh specimen 

 there were thirty teeth, eighteen above and twelve 

 below. 



THE COMMON PORPOISE {Phocana communk) or 

 PORPESSE, is well known to the inhabitants of the 

 shores of our sea-girt islands. It is the most abundant 

 of aU the Cetacea which visit our coasts. The hide 

 exhibits a uniformly deep black colom', except along the 

 central hne of the belly where it is wliitish. A full- 

 grown Porpoise varies in length from five to eight feet. 

 In dissecting several examples, we have been particu- 

 larly struck with die immense length (,f the intestines, 

 and in one example, shot in the Frith of Forth, we found 

 five intestinal cestode worms, four of which measured 

 about ten feet each in length, besides others, parasites 

 in the lungs and liver. These entozoa are described in 

 the 22nd volume of the Linnsean Society's Transac- 



tions. Porpoises frequently travel some distance up 

 our rivers, and it is very interesting to watch their 

 playful antics as they tumble to and fro on the tight fan- 

 tastic wave. They visit the Thames nearly every year, 

 and sometimes venture as far as London Bridge. Mr. 

 BeU records an interesting note of their appearance 

 many years ago in the river Wareham, in Dorsetshire. 

 On one occasion, at the close of the year, two that were 

 taken hi this river yielded sixteen gallons of oil. "One 

 of them was found to have mUk, which some gentle- 

 men tasted, and pronounced to be salt and fishy. About 

 the same season, three years afterwards, three others 

 were driven up die river to the town of Wareham; 

 they were full-grown animals, aU about the same size. 

 A fence was put across the river abo%'e and below 

 them, in order to retain them for exhibition ; but they 

 plunged so violently, and their cries — which they con- 

 tinued during the niglit as well as the day — were so 



