Befez. 
= 
= eeth e 
m pon ® Ba ke” seem 
We are at a lofs to account for.the origin of thofe 
fables, fince it does not appear that the dolphin fhews 
a greater attachment to mankind than the reft of the 
cetaceous tribe. We know that at prefent the ap- 
pearance of this fith, and the porpeffe, are far from 
being efteemed favorable omens by the feamen; for 
their boundings, fprings and frolics in the water, are 
_ held to be fure figns of an approaching gale, 
It is from their leaps out of that element that 
they affume a temporary form that is not natural to 
them, but which the old painters and fculptors 
have almoft always giventhem. A dolphin is fcarce 
ever exhibited by the antients in a ftrait fhape, but 
almoft always incurvated : fuch are thofe on the coin 
of Alexander the Great, which is preferved by Belon, 
as well as on feveral other pieces of antiquity. The 
poets defcribe them much in the fame manner, and 
it is not improbable but that the one had borrowed 
from the other : 
Tumidumque pando tranfilit dorfo mare 
‘Tyrrhenus omni pifcis exfultat freto, 
Agitatque gyros. Senec. Trag. Agam. 450. 
Upon the {welling waves the dolphins fhew 
Their bended backs, then {wiftly darting go, 
And in athoufand wreaths their bodies throw. 
The natural fhape of the dolphin is almoft ftrait, 
the back being very flightly incurvated, and the 
body flender: the nofe 1s long, narrow, and point- 
ed, not much unlike the beak of fome birds, for 
which reafon the French call it L’ ove de mer. 
It has in all forty-two teeth, twenty-one in the 
upper jaws, and nineteen in the lower, a little above 
ag 
