OEDEE OF CETACEA. 8Y 



into the Arctic regions, informed me tliat he had known a "Whale 

 toss a boat nearly three feet into the air, and itself rise so high 

 out of the water that you could see beneath it, but that, if 

 Scoresby's figure was correct, the Whale must have tossed the 

 boat very many feet into the air — a feat which he did not 

 think was within the bounds of, if not posFibdity, yet of proba- 

 bility."* 



With respect to the Whale " spouting," as it is commonly 

 styled, Mr. Brown remarks, that " most of the slimy-looking 

 substances found floating in the Arctic seas are generally masses 

 of I)iato7nacee combined with Protozoa, &c. ; but in some cases it is 

 the mucous lining of the bronchial passages which has been dis- 

 charged when the animal was 'blowing.' This 'blowing,' so 

 familiar a feature in the Cetaceans, but especially of the Right 

 Whales, is quite analogous to the breathing of the higher mam- 

 mals, and the 'blow-holes' are the perfect analogues of the 

 nostrils. It is most erroneously stated that the Whale ejects water 

 from the ' blow-holes.' I have been many times only a few feet 

 from the Whale when ' blowing,' and, though purposely observing 

 it, coiild never see that it ejected from its nostrils anything but 

 the ordinary breath, a fact which might have almost been deduced 

 from analogy. In the cold Arctic air this breath is generally 

 condensed, and falls upon those close at hand in the form of a 

 dense spray, which may have led seamen to suppose that this 

 vapour was originally ejected in the form of water. Occasionally 

 when the Whale blows just as it is rising out of, or sinking in, 

 the sea, a little of the superincumbent water may be ejected 

 upwards by the column of breath. When the Whale is wounded 

 in the lungs, or in any of the blood-vessels immediately supplying 

 them, blood, as might be expected, is ejected in the death-throes 

 along with the breath. When the whaler sees his prey ' spouting 

 red,' he concludes that its end is not far distant ; for it is then 

 mortally wounded." 



" After Man, the chief enemy of the Whale is Orca gladiator, the 

 most savage of all the Cetaceans, and the only one which feeds 

 upon other animals belonging to the order. The Thresher Sharkf 



* In the South Atlantic Ocean, near the island of Tristan dAcuna, the evening 

 previous to a gale of wind, we have seen several large Whales repeatedly jump clear 



of the water. — En. . ,, -r, , , ,> t,- ^ ti ^i. 



t Specimens of which are to be found m Mr. Buokland s Museum at South 



Kensington. 



