180 NIMBOD OF THE SEA; OS, 



possible for the sperm -whale to descend to such depths 

 witliia the limits of the great polar streams as to lie sus- 

 pended in a temperature authorizing the term of hiberna- 

 tion. According to the observations of the United States 

 Exploring Expedition, the water in the neighborhood of 

 Cape Horn at four hundred fathoms fell to a temperature 

 of 28° Fahrenheit, and they traced a powerful current of 

 this cold water setting north, along the west coast of South 

 America, until it reached the Galapagos, at which point the 

 temperature of the water is so low as to prevent the forma^ 

 tion of coral on the reefs and in the bays. These currents 

 are supposed to waft the squid and other food of the sperm- 

 whale from the frigid zones, and in them the whalemen look 

 for their pr^y. Whales, in soundings, have carried out six 

 hundred fathoms of line, and at such depths they would 

 surely meet the icy influences of polar seas. 



Sperm-whales have a means of communicating with each 

 other at long distances — how long has never been deter- 

 mined; but certainly at distances as great as are command- 

 ed by the eye from the mast-head of a ship, or a radius of 

 six or seven miles. The means are a mystery, but every 

 whaleman has observed the fact, and has based his opera- 

 tions in the chase upon it. It has been suggested that, as 

 water is so good a conductor of sound, it may be by sound ; 

 but the distances are too great for any sound which the 

 whale is capable of making to peiietrate; and it is ob- 

 served that the telegraph is perfect- as ever in high winds, 

 when a thousand waves are breaking. Dart an iron into a 

 bull whale, or gallie him by going on his eye, and almost 

 simultaneously with his cutting flukes in the air the whole 

 school will show alarm by running and cutting their flukes, 

 or by disappearing from the surface, and coming up miles 

 to windward and running head out. If it be a cow that is 

 struck, the bulls are arrested in flight, and are apt to gather 



