THE ARCTIC SEAS. 157 
thinness of its blubber, and the shortness of its 
whalebone, render it of far less value than the other 
species; besides which, its swiftness, strength, and 
determination, render it a hazardous enemy to en- 
counter. Hence it is usually avoided by the whalers, 
though the adventurous inhabitants of the Arctic 
shores of Europe do not hesitate to attack it. It 
is worthy of our notice, however, on account of its 
affording an instance of what has been called, in 
an examination of the care of Almighty God over 
his inferior creatures, the principle of compensation. 
When any organ, or set of organs that answer pur- 
poses very important in the economy of an animal, 
are removed in a kindred species with similar habits, 
or are so modified as no longer to serve the same 
‘purpose, some new structure is bestowed upon it, 
to supply the lack of that which is removed. We 
have seen how the Whale feeds, by receiving into its 
mouth a large quantity of water, which is filtered 
through the whalebone. In order to this, the mouth 
is made very capacious by the bowing over of the 
upper jaws in the form of a high arch, the blades of 
whalebone filling up the bow. But in the Rorqual 
the two jaws are nearly straight, and the blades vary 
little in length, so that thus far the cavity of the 
mouth is inconsiderable. Here comes in the com- 
pensation: the lower part of the mouth (or, exter- 
nally, the chin and throat), instead of being stretched 
tightly across the branches of the lower jaw, are 
wrinkled up into many longitudinal folds, which, 
when the water rushes into the mouth, expand and 
make a capacious pouch or bag. On shutting the 
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