274 A. E. Verrill—The Bermuda Islands. 686 
From what is known of the migratory habits of the Hump-backs, 
on the American coasts, they probably go south in the autumn, as far 
at least as the West Indies, or even South America, to spend the 
winter, and while there bring forth their young. In the last of the 
winter or early spring they start northward, probably following, for 
the most part, the course of the Gulf Stream. But groups of them, 
mostly females with their young, were in the habit of tarrying, dur- 
ing the spring months, about the Bermudas, leaving for the northern 
waters about the last of May or first half of June, and sometimes not 
till July. Perhaps the same individuals did not remain there all that 
time, but those that left early may have been replaced by later 
arrivals from the south. 
Whether any of the young ones were ordinarily born in Bermuda 
waters is uncertain.* From the small size of some of the ‘‘cubs” 
taken with their mothers (15 feet long) it is not improbable that 
some were born there ; but most of the cubs were 20 to 30 feet long, 
and those must have been born in more southern seas. We do not 
have many facts as to the rate of growth of these young whales, 
but probably it takes several months for them to become 25 feet long. 
It appears, from the early accounts, that the females with their 
cubs used to come into shallow water, near the shores and reefs ; 
sometimes, though rarely, they penetrated through the reefs by the 
channels and entered the lagoon, as far as Murray anchorage, at least. 
An instance of this kind is recorded in 1803, by an officer of 
H. M. S. “Leander,” who stated that a whale, probably of this 
species, in Murray anchorage, while he was near it in a cutter, leaped 
like a salmon, with a sudden spring, entirely out of the sea, so that 
its body was horizontal in the air and half its breadth above the 
water. It caused a great commotion when it fell heavily back into 
the sea, “ with a thundering crash.” 
Early writers speak of its playing with its young, often tossing 
them quite out of the water with its snout, when so near the south 
shore that they could be easily observed. This was done particularly 
in pleasant moonlight nights. But no such sight has been seen 
during the past sixty years, so far as I can learn. 
Bermuda newspapers have records of the capture of single speci- 
mens, mostly young, showing quite conclusively that they have been 
comparatively rare for sixty years or more. 
* The whale fishermen at Bermuda do not think that the whales were in the 
habit of breeding there. 
