ON THE GREENLAND RIGHT-WHALE. 23 



Tvhicli one of the authors (Eschricht) has received from Professor Geffrey, at Bourdeaux. In a 

 manuscript essay about the discovery of Newfoundland, composed in 1710, and kept in the archives 

 of the tovpn of Pau, we read that the Basques found a whale in the sea near the Bank of New- 

 foundland different from that which they knew on their own shores (the Sarda), and which they 

 called " Sardaco-Baleac," because it moved in flocks.'^ 



According to these statements, it can scarcely be doubted that the Greenland whales 

 formerly appeared near the coast of Newfoundland; it is therefore likely to be still found 

 there now and then, although we have met with no certain statement to that effect ; ^ but that 

 it has appeared there in numbers in our time is, at all events, contradicted by the fact that the 

 whalers had their southernmost fishing-place two degrees more northerly, near Resolution Island. 

 It is not shown by the above statements at what season of the year the Greenland whale was to 

 he found near Newfoundland ; but, from what we otherwise know of its nature and habits, we 

 cannot but suppose that it must have been only at the season when the coasts of Newfoundland are 

 encircled by ice, and that the right-whales, roaming in the bays and the surrounding sea when 

 summer was far advanced, and caught afc this season by the ancient whalers in the beginning of 

 the fifteenth century, belonged to the short-bone species. 



Supposing this to be the case, it would be easy to explain how it was that the Basques did 

 not become acquainted with the Greenland whale in the years immediately following the discovery 

 of Tierra de los Baccalaos, but not till the navigation to this island and the surrounding countries 

 had greatly increased, or perhaps not till attempts at founding settlements had already taken 



■^ The whole passage referred to is, according to the copy of the essay so kindly trans- 

 mitted to us^ to the following effect : — " L'usage des compas de route et celui de la balestrille ne 

 fut pas plutot connu, que les Basques, excites par le lucre de cette pecherie, s'embarquerent sur des 

 navires pour chercher le repaire de ces animaux, et ayant connus par experience qu'etant venus de 

 chea eux fesant la route a I'ouest et ayant trouve de plus en plus de baleines å mesures qu'ils avangaient 

 sur cette route, ils la choisirent pour diriger leurs poursuites, et arriverent ainsi au banc de Terre- 

 Weuve oil ils en trouverent par troupes et comme l'espéce qu'ils y trouverent était dififérente de celle 

 quails voyaient sur leurs cotes, pour la distinguer ils la nommerent " Sardaco Baléac/' qui en leur langue 

 signifie Baleines de troupe.^' 



" It is true that Blasius tells us, in his ' NaturgescMchte der Saugethiere Deutschlands,' p. 539, 

 that as late as October, 1833, a Greenland whale appeared in the B,iver St. Lawrence as far from the 

 mouth of the river as Montreal, but it is not improbable that this statement (in which, by the way, 

 the year 1833 is given instead of 1823) may prove to he erroneous. It is borrowed from P. Cuvier, 

 who, on the authority of the ' Edinburgh Philosophical Journal ' for 1834, gives this case as a proof of 

 the fact that " les baleines," as well as " les dauphins ou les marsouins,'^ may live in fresh water 

 ('De I'Hist. nat. de Cétacés,' p. 391). But that this "^baleine" was a Greenland whale, or even 

 a right-whale, M. Cuvier does not say, nor is such a supposition in any way borne out by the 

 original statement, which runs thus : — " Habits of the Whale. — In October last a whale appeared in 

 the river St. Lawrence, as high up as the city of Montreal. The animal was pursued by a number of 

 boats, and was at last taken at Boucherville, a distance of nine miles from town. It was exhibited 

 at Montreal, then towed for exhibition to Quebec. This animal must have come from the Whale Bank 

 off Newfoundland, which is the nearest place where whales are generally found, and have wandered at 

 3east 1000 miles in a straight line up the gulf and river before it was taken, 350 or 400 of which 

 must have been fresh water." 'Edinb. Phil. Journ.,' 1824, April — October, p. 220. [It was probably 

 a Beluga or White Whale {Beluga leucas) a species common in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, — W. H. P.] 



