Quadrupeds <Sfc. 1161 



calities, it is not uncommon to find pieces of rock salt placed in the farm-yards for the 

 cattle and horses to lick. — Edmund Thos. Higgins ; 8, Lansdown Place, Clifton. 



The Time and Manner of the Procreation of some species of Whales. The manners 

 of the cetaceous animals of even our own seas, when free in their native element, have 

 been so little observed, that every opportunity of studying them deserves to be dili- 

 gently employed, and every authentic remark treasured up ; by which means we may 

 hope, in time, to obtain possession of some interesting knowledge of the distinctive 

 habits of the different species. It is true, that in consequence of the element they in- 

 habit, and the situations in which for the most part they are found, a portion of this 

 information may come to us rather from enquiry among unscientific persons, than di- 

 rect observation ; and that consequently a less degree of confidence will be placed in 

 it, from possible inaccuracy in the reporter. Yet. it ought not, even on this account, 

 to be neglected ; and when a fact is corroborated by more than one person, and it is 

 supported by collateral circumstances, with perhaps the evidence of ancient narratives, 

 that have been rather passed over as uncertain than rejected as false, and therefore are 

 only waiting to be re-observed, it comes forward with claims which the naturalist will 

 find it difficult to refuse. These remarks are suggested by a comparison of notes, 

 which, with a long interval, I have inserted in my journal, and which I now beg 

 leave to communicate to the readers of ' The Zoologist.' In the year 1828, while 

 conversing with some fishermen on the subject of a large whale then exciting some at- 

 tention on our coast, one of them informed me of the following circumstance, to which 

 he was a witness some time before, in the Bay of Biscay ; and for the truth of which 

 he appealed to a man then standing by, who was then in the same ship, and noted the 

 same occurrence, as, indeed, at the time, did the whole ship's crew. A very great num- 

 ber of whales, of the smaller kind, were assembled in a company, he supposed to the 

 amount of a hundred or two ; and they were observed to raise themselves in pairs, suc- 

 cessively, with their anterior parts bolt upright in the water. Each pair, close toge- 

 ther, were so elevated but for a short time ; but they continued to do this in distinct 

 pairs, for at least an hour ; and at the same time they continued to utter loud and dis- 

 agreeable sounds, which the other man compared to the neighing of a horse. When 

 thus elevated above the surface, he supposed each pair to resemble the trunks of a 

 couple of oak trees. A sailor who was on board the ship at the time, informed the 

 rest, that he had witnessed similar occurrences before ; and that they were engaged in 

 the act of procreation : a circumstance of which my informant entertained no doubt. 

 At the time when this information was noted down, I was not aware that anything at 

 all resembling it had ever been recorded ; and therefore I was as much surprized as 

 gratified to meet with the following, in Kuysch's 'Theatrum omnium Animalium,' vol. 

 i. folio. " De coitu partuque (verba sunt Schonfeldii) venatores referuut, Balaenas 

 contracta societate et consuetudine in amorem mutuum, quum conjunctione, saltatione 

 aliisque affectuum conjugalium significationibus inter se testantur coire ; hinc una 

 natare semper, amicitiamque caeptam conservare, donee accensa ad libidinem fcemina, 

 erecto ad perpendiculum et in caudam corpore, marem eodem positu obvium, pinnis 

 suis tanquam brachiis duobus, amplectatur, mutuoque complexu per horae dimidium, 

 vel integram utraeque haereant." A further corroboration of the accuracy of these par- 

 ticulars was received in the course of the present summer, (1845) ; when a fisherman 

 who is in the habit of bringing me a variety of specimens, and whatever information 

 falls in his way, informed me, that on the 18th of July, at a very early hour in the 

 morning, when he was engaged in examining his crab-pots, and consequently not far 

 iii 4 E 



