OEDER OF CETACEA. 61 



furtTier divisions have since been proposed, as additional species 

 have been distinguished ; for it now appears that there are really 

 very many kinds of these enormous Cetaceans, which are only 

 beginning to be understood by naturalists who make an especial 

 study of them. 



Some of the Rorquals are the longest of all known animals, 

 attaining to more than a hundred feet in length, or, in other 

 words, to about half the length of the London Monument. One 

 of the most gigantic species [Bahmoptera Indica) inhabits tlio 

 Indian Ocean, and there is a very early notice of this animal as 

 observed at the northern extremity of the Arabian Sea, iii the 

 narrative of the famous voyage of Nearchus, the commander of 

 Alexander's fleet, which sailed from the Indus to the Persian 

 Gulf, 327 B.C. Not only did the ancient navigator encounter a 

 troop of these huge animals, but it would appear that they were 

 at that time not unfrequently stranded on the coast of Mekran, 

 where the Icthijophagl of that woodless region used their bones foi' 

 building purposes. "The generality of the people (as we are told 

 by Arrian) live in cabins, small and stifling : the better sort only 

 have houses constructed with the bones of "Whales ; for Whales are 

 frequentljr thrown up on the coast, and when the flesh is rotted 

 off, they take the bones, making planks and doors of snch as are 

 flat, and beams or rafters of the ribs or jaw-bones ; and many of 

 these monsters are found fifty yards (?) in length. Strabo confirms 

 this report of Arrian ; and adds, that the vertebrae or socket-bones 

 of the back are formed into mortars, in which they pormd their 

 fish, and mix it up into a paste, with the addition of a little meal." * 

 In more recent times the bones of Whales have been used for 

 building purposes on the shores of the Polar Sea, at the north- 

 eastern extremity of Siberia. Thus Admiral Yon WrangeU re- 

 marks that — " At many places along this coast we saw the bones 

 of "\¥hales stuck iTpright in the ground ; our interpreter, and sub- 

 sequently the Tschuktschi whom we met, said that they were the 

 remains of the former dwellings of a stationary tribe. They 

 appeared to have been of a better and more solid kind than are 

 now used, and to have been partly sunk in the groimd." And 

 again : — " There are traditions which relate that two centuries 

 ago the Onkilon occupied the whole of the coast from Cape 

 * Vincent's Voijage of Nearchus, p. 267. 



