CHAPTER III 

 THE MYSTICETUS, OR RIGHT WHALE 



PARTLY because my acquaintance with him is so 

 much less, and partly because I know that his 

 intelligence is of a much lower order than that of 

 the sperm whale, I shall not permit this huge creature 

 to tell his own story. Indeed, I could not ; for there is a 

 secret connected with this particular whale which has 

 never yet been revealed, nor, although it is a bold thing 

 to say, does there seem any prospect that it will be. 

 Briefly, it is, what does he do with himself during the 

 long night of the Arctic regions, when open water, 

 absolutely necessary to him as to other sea-mammals, 

 is not obtainable, all the Polar Seas being locked under 

 many feet of ice ? Nothing can well be more certain 

 than that he does not come south. He has never been 

 seen in temperate waters, not though the enterprising 

 whale-fishers, driven south by the encroaching ice at 

 the approach of winter have sought him with infinite 

 care. Where, then, does he spend the long months of 

 the Arctic winter, utterly dark but for the Northern 

 Lights (Aurora Borealis), utterly unnavigable by any 

 ice-breaker known ? 



Some have formulated a theory of an open Polar 

 Sea, whither birds and mammals retire during this 

 bitter time, but the idea is chimerical, untenable for 

 a moment. If there is anything firmly settled con- 

 cerning the Arctic regions it is that, whether any 



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