44 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
we again found it discoloured at night. The diatom-stained 
water, so far as we observed, lay to the north-eastwards, its 
western outline agreeing with the margin of the heavy ice, and 
its southern, for some distance eastwards from the ice-edge, with 
the parallel of lat. 78°. The first Whales we saw were in lat. 79°, 
and we continued seeing them as we drifted southwards until the 
colour of the water became blue. In this case, then, the dis- 
coloured water and the Whales also were maintaining their 
position, while we ourselves, along with the ice, were being drifted 
southwards with the wind. Moreover, I observed a few days 
afterwards, while lying in the blue clear water to the southward 
of the discoloured water, that many of the pieces of ice had their 
margins tinged with an orange-yellow, showing that while drifting 
southwards they had encountered an abundance of diatoms 
floating in the water. Only one Whale seen to-day ; it rose close 
under the bows, but, hearing the ship, made off immediately into 
the ice. 
May 28.—Lat. 77° 58’, long. 2°21’. Water slightly green; 
temperature at the surface, 29°. In the morning a Whale was 
reported coming up from the southward, towards the open 
space of water in which we were lying. ‘Two boats, which 
lowered away from the ship, took up positions and awaited 
the appearance of the animal, continuing, however, to pull slowly 
to windward to keep their ground. As ill luck would have it, one 
of the boats happened to be pulling just over the place where the 
Whale intended to rise, and the animal, alarmed evidently by the 
movement of the oars, ‘‘ smothered its blast,” as whalemen say 
(i. e., discharged, while under water, a large volume of air which it 
probably had intended to expire), and then set off into the ice 
without ever rising to the surface. 
May 30.—Lat. 78° 5°, long. 3° 30’ W. Water slightly green; 
temperature at the surface, 29°. Two Blue Fin-Whales, 
Balenoptera Sibbaldii, appeared near the ship during the day, 
the ice evidently having already opened out sufficiently to enable 
these animals to find their way on to the rich feeding-grounds in 
the neighbourhood. The appearance of “ Finners,” as these 
Whales are called, on the whaling-grounds, heralding, as it does, 
the speedy departure of Mysticetus icewards to less accessible 
regions, is not regarded with much favour by the whalemen. So 
intimately related geographically as these animals undoubtedly 
