Tarte 
SuaE: 
WHALE-TAILED MANATI. 
body like a cruft, and is of fingular ufe to the animal during winter,. 
in protecting it againft the ice, under which it often feeds, or againft 
the fhatp-pointed rocks, againft which it is often dafhed by the 
wintry ftorms. It is alfo an equal guard againft the fummer heats ; 
for this animal does not, like moft other marine creatures, feed at 
the bottom, but with part of the body expofed, as well to the rays 
of the fun as to the piercing cold of the froft. In faét, this inte- 
gument is fo effential to its prefervation, that Sted/er has obferved 
feveral dead on the fhore, which he believes were killed by the ac- 
cidental privation of it. The color of this fkin, when wet, is dufky, 
when dried, quite black. 
The tail is horizontally flat; black, and ending in a {tiff fin, com~- 
pofed of laminz like whale-bone, terminating with fibres near nine- 
inches.long. It is flightly forked; but both ends are of equak 
lengths, like the tail of a Whale. 
It has two teats placed exaétly on the breaft. The milk is thick 
and fweet, not unlike that of aEwe. Thefe animals copulate more 
hbumano, and in the feafon of courtfhip fport long in the fea; the 
female feigning to fhun the embraces of the male, who purfues her. 
through all the mazes of her flight. 
The body, from the fhoulders to the navel, is very thick; from: 
thence to the tail grows gradually more flender. The belly is very- 
large ; and, by reafon of the quantity of entrails, very tumid. 
Thefe animals grow to the length of twenty-eight feet. The 
meafurements of one fomewhat leffer, as given by Mr. StelJer, are as 
follow : 
The length, from the nofe to the end of the tail, twenty-four 
feet and a half: from the nofe to the fhoulders, or fetting-on of the 
fins, four feet four. The circumference of the head,. above the- 
noftrils, two feet feven ; above the ears, four feet: at the nape of the: 
neck, near feven feet: at the fhoulders, twelve: about the belly, 
above twenty: near the tail, only four feet eight ;. the extent of the: 
tail, from point to point, fix feet and.a half. 
The 
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