255-2 The Zoologist — April, 1871. 



Black or Greenland Whale [Baltena mysticetus, Linn.) This 

 appears to be the largest species of whale in the northern hemi- 

 sphere. A very poor specimen, seventy feet long, yielded sixty-six 

 barrels, or nineteen hundred and eighty gallons of oil. The fat, or 

 " blubber," of the Greenland whale is said to be more productive 

 and of more value than any other species. The oil of the one here 

 mentioned realized upwards of £250 : had the same whale been 

 very fat it would have been worth more than double this amount. 

 A "calf" — i.e. young whale — of this species, which drove ashore 

 at a settlement called Daniel's Harbour, and which had previously 

 been partly "sculped" by some whalers, realized, I was told, the 

 handsome sum of £400. This specimen when entire was valued 

 by an old whaler at £1000 Nova Scotia currency, or about £800 

 sterling ! 



Barnacle Whale (B. cis-artica, Cope, or Ar/nphelus gibbosus, 

 Cope). Not so common as the "sulphur-bottom" or "hump- 

 backed," but more so, perhaps, than either the " Fin-back," or 

 Greenland whale. Jaw-bones and vertebrae of whales are " common 

 objects of the shore" in Newfoundland, although the settlers utilize 

 the former by sawing them into long narrow strips, which they nail 

 on to the "runners" of their sledges — a process which is termed 

 " shoeing with whalebone." A pair of jaw-bones lying on the beach 

 at Cow Head (but of which species I cannot say) measured nearly 

 eighteen feet long. 



As wilh the Phocida; so with the Cetacea:, great confusion exists 

 in their nomenclature, it is no easy matter to transport the .skeletons 

 of these unwieldy mammals to the portals of our public museums, or 

 to the studios of distinguished naturalists. Where practicable, cor- 

 rect drawings — or, better still, good photographs — should be taken 

 before the animal is "sculped," and afterwards of the skeleton, or, 

 at any rale, of the most desirable portions of it. This, perhaps, 

 could only be accomplished with "stranded" whales. The great 

 emporium for the study of these leviathans is, undoubtedly, the deck 

 of a whaler, where it would certainly be very difficult, if not almost 

 impossible, to get a correct portrait of a floating carcass, and even 

 more so of any portion of the skeleton. The dead whale is fastened 

 wilh ropes to the side of the vessel ; the upper surface of the body, 

 which floats above water, is first "sculped"; the remaining half 

 is then turned over by ])ulleys, to undergo a similar process of 

 sculping. 



