SOUTH AMERICAN MANATEE 
mechanism of the upper lip; this is split in two, and the two 
halves, which are furnished with strong bristles, can play upon 
each other like the points of a pair of forceps.” 
Manatees were once plentiful on both coasts of Florida, 
but now a few carefully guarded near Miami alone remain. 
They still wallow in all the inlets and estuaries along the Gulf 
coast of Central America; and the South American nail-less 
species is one of the commonest game animals of the Amazon 
and Orinoco basins, incessantly hunted by both Indians and 
white men for the flesh and the oil. Dampier’s opinion of the 
edibility of the animal in Campeachy was this: — - ue 
“Their Flesh is white, both the Fat and the Lean, and extraordinary 
sweet, wholesome meat. The tail of a young cow is most esteemed; but 
if old, both Head and Tail are very tough. A Calf that sucks is the most 
delicate meat; Privateers commonly roast them: as they do great Pieces 
cut out of the Bellies of the old ones.” 
Here, did it fall within my plan, would follow the history 
and account of the whales, grampuses, porpoises, and related 
marine mammals, of the order Cetacea. The leading authori- 
ties for unscientific readers on this group of animals are Bed- 
dard, Bullen,“* Scammon,'® and the publications of the 
United States Bureau of Fisheries. 
WHALEBONE IN MOUTH OF A BALEEN WHALE, 
403 
