134 



NA TURE 



[June 9, 1904 



steam conies out of the water ; the back of the animal 

 emerges immediately afterwards ; in the movement necessary 

 to recover (he horizontal position of its head, the dorsal 

 fin appear-' and finally the lumbar region, which is much 

 curved by the action of the tail, which determines the de- 

 scent. It now proceeds for several lengths, hardly sub- 

 merged, whilst the steersman, who can see the lighter- 

 coloured portions of this immense body, and sometimes 



Fig. 2 — Harpooning a Whale. 



certain pools caused by the motion of the dorsal fin, steers 

 the boat, driven by all the force of its crew, so as to cross 

 the route of the cetacean. A fresh blow cuts the water, a 

 black back presents itself at a distance of five or six metres, 

 the shot is fired, and the eye can follow the harpoon with 

 the attached line. 



But at the first moment there is nothing to show that the 

 animal has been touched. In a bodv of such size the arrival 



the whale-boat ; nobody moves, and the turns of the line, 

 carefully coiled in a receptacle, run out without a check. 

 A second boat approaches in order to take the end of this 

 line, when it is apparent that the thousand metres in the 

 first boat will not be sufficient, and to add it to his own 

 line. The running out is continued from this boat, and 

 sometimes the three whale boats are rapidly cleared of their 

 lines. But, with the friction which such a length of line 

 offers, and to which the resistance of the boats towed has 

 to be added, the cetacean reduces its speed very sensiblv, 

 so that there is no difficulty in maintaining it. Little by 

 little the line is got back into the boats, and after various 

 alternations the weakened animal advances more and more 

 slowly, and close to the surface, where it is obliged to 

 breathe more and more frequently. 



Often many hours have passed before the favourable 

 moment arrives for despatching the unfortunate victim and 

 terminating the drama, and this is accompanied by the most 

 serious circumstances of the whole enterprise. The ex- 

 hausted animal stretches itself on the surface, almost motion- 

 less before the boat, where the harpooneer now holds a lance 

 which has a considerable length, because it must pass 

 through the whole thickness of the blubber and of the 

 muscles before it reaches the vital organs. He approaches 

 the animal bv its side, so as not to be struck hv the tail. 



of sensation in the brain and the transmission of the will 

 to the periphery require a sensible time. The success of 

 the harpooneer is indicated by the rapid running out of the 

 line, which very soon produces heat and a dense smoke in 

 the bollard, round which a turn is taken in order to allow 

 the harpooneer to regulate the run of the line according to 

 the velocity of the cetacean and the direction which it 

 follows. This is a verv delicate moment for the safetv of 



41 



Fig. 4-Haiilin 



which may be thrown violently into the air so soon as the 

 cetacean receives this new wound ; but it is not always 

 possible to avoid being struck by a fin, and especially in 

 the case of large animals, this may wreck a boat. In spite 

 of all the skill of the crew an accident of this kind may 

 occur, and I could relate cases mentioned by various captains 

 in which cachalots, old and solitary individuals, have seized 

 and crushed between their jaws the boats which have 

 attacked them. It has even been reported that two ships 

 have been sunk by such animals in their fury, their enormous 

 wedge-shaped head becoming in these circumstances a 

 formidable ram. 



\\'hen a cetacean of any size has been several times 

 pierced, the red pool which spreads far over the sea gives 

 the idea of great carnage. In fact the cetaceans contain 

 a verv large amount of blood, and before the last hour, when 

 thev lose it in torrents, they have already left behind them 

 a red track of eight or ten miles in length over which they 

 have towed the boats. 



I have said that apart from the interest which each species 

 of cetacean offers of itself (and it appears that some of them 

 are hardly known at all), it is in the first place the contents 

 of their stomachs which occupy us. The species which I 

 have taken differ much in the nature of their prey, and 

 their mouths are armed correspondingly. The right xvliale 



NO. 1806, VOL. 70] 



