The Zoologist — April, 1871. 2551 



phrase in Newfoundland, and this last undoubtedly expresses the 

 superlative degree of bellowing, for I never heard any moi'e dismal 

 or distressing roar than that of a mighty Cetacean being crushed, 

 as it»were, in a field of ice. 



Whales, like seals and other mammals, vary greatly in their 

 degrees of fatness. Sometimes some of those washed ashore are 

 carcases abandoned in a gale of wind by the whalers, and as 

 whaling is generally carried on in the late spring and summer 

 months decomposition often sets in before they are found by the 

 settlers. 



Five species of whales are said to occur on the coast of New- 

 foundland, and Professor Gill has kindly endeavoured to identify 

 the provincial names as follows : — 



Sulphur-bottom Whale {Sihbaldius borealis, Fischer). This 

 species is tolerably common. Five (said to be " sulphur-bottoms") 

 were driven ashore by drift-ice at Great Codroy River in April, 1868. 

 Some of them reach a large size and yield a great quantity of oil. 

 One that was discovered floating dead on the water, near Cow Head, 

 was towed into the harbour : it measured seventy-five feet long, and 

 yielded fifty-five barrels, or sixteen hundred and fifty gallons, of oil- 

 The jaws of this monster were eighteen feet in length. 



Fin-back Whale (S. ieciirosiris, Cope, or related species). Not 

 so common as the preceding or following species. 



Humpbacked Whale {Megaplera longimana, Rudolphi, or 

 M. osphyia. Cope). Perhaps not so common as the "sulphur- 

 bottom," but equally well known to the settlers. A specimen 

 seventy-five feet long, but which had lost a large quantity of oil 

 from decomposing and bursting, yielded forty-lwo barrels nineteen 

 gallons. Ten barrels of oil were dipped up in buckets from the 

 inside of this whale, which had not escaped from the bursting of 

 the carcass. The presence of this dead whale was discovered by 

 following the track of a wide " streak" of oil, which was carried by 

 the tide on the surface of the water by the harbour of Cow Head. 

 I have often seen these oily streams visible on top of the water for 

 at least half a mile, and that only from the decomposing carcass of 

 a young seal, perhaps not more than three feet in length, and whose 

 whole body would not yield the third part of a barrel of oil. This 

 will give some idea of how far these oil-streams may be traced to 

 the body of a whale, from which, perhaps, fifteen or even twenty 

 barrels of oil may have escaped. 



