May 26, 1905.] 



SCIENCE. 



815 



tains much information as to the extent and 

 methods of the early whale fisheries on the 

 eastern coast of North America. We learn 

 that at a very early date (by the middle of the 

 sixteenth century) there was a regularly es- 

 tablished whale fishery on the coast of New- 

 foundland, while it is rather saddening to see 

 how abundant were whales in those early days. 

 Surely if the killing of whales has any direct 

 or serious effect on any other fishery this effect 

 must have been felt many years ago. 



Chapter two is ' A Chronological Account 

 of Important Contributions to the Natural 

 History of North American Whalebone 

 Whales ' and in it, under date of 1741, we 

 have the first systematic summary of the then 

 known or recognized American species, in 

 which some of them appear under the common 

 English names by which they are yet known. 

 It is a striking commentary on the lack of 

 knowledge, or rather the large amount of mis- 

 information, regarding whales, to note that 

 this list is quite as understandable, and de- 

 cidedly more accurate, than Gray's synopsis 

 published in 1871. 



This leads naturally to ' A Review of Cope's 

 and Scammon's Species,' in which the species 

 of the Atlantic coast are ruthlessly slaugh- 

 tered, while later on doubt is cast on the spe- 

 cific identity of the larger Pacific whales 

 which may prove to be identical with those 

 of the Atlantic. 



Chapters four to eight contain a systematic 

 review, with many details as to measurements 

 and coloration, of the finback, sulphurbottom, 

 little piked whale, humpback and North At- 

 lantic right whale, abundant comparisons 

 being made with the w(irk of other writers. 

 Here we get what we actually know regarding 

 the size, proportions and coloration of these 

 great animals, and before passing to the con- 

 clusions deduced from them it may be worth 

 while to note one or two points about the 

 sulphurbottom, which is the largest of verte- 

 brates. By the courtesy of Mr. Pike and 

 Captain Bull, of the Cabot Company, it is 

 possible to supply the measurements of the 

 flukes, which Dr. True was unable to obtain, 

 and to say that in males respectively 74 feet 

 8 inches and 74 feet 4 inches from fluke notch 



to tip of nose they were 16 feet 5 inches and 

 17 feet 2 inches in greatest spread. Various 

 measurements of sulphurbottoms taken in 

 1903 agree with those taken by Dr. True, save 

 that one female measured by him attained a 

 length of 77 feet, or two feet more than any 

 animal seen in 1903. As to the specimens 

 noted abroad as having lengths of from 90 to 

 100 feet the reviewer frankly states his dis- 

 belief in their existence, though willing to 

 grant that some giant may now and then 

 reach a length over all, from tip of flukes to 

 underhang of lower law, of 90 feet. 



That the measurements of whales taken on 

 the Norway coast should decidedly exceed 

 those taken elsewhere is rather strange, and 

 though it is barely possible that the largest 

 animals occur there, the reviewer pleads guilty 

 to a desire to measure one such animal him- 

 self, the more that it has never fallen to his 

 lot to measure any animal that came up to 

 the standard of size set by others. It is re- 

 grettable that the one measurement of a 

 whale, from tip of nose to eye, that can be 

 talvcn with certainty, is no safe criterion of 

 the size of the animal, since the comparative 

 length of the head is so extremely variable 

 that there may be a difference of nearly a foot 

 in this respect between two animals of equal 

 length. 



This naturally lessens the value of any 

 ratios that may be made between the propor- 

 tions of two whales. It is both interesting 

 and discouraging to see how measurements of 

 whales vary, but a part of the discrepancies 

 shown may be explained by the difficulty com- 

 monly experienced in measuring cetaceans, 

 while others are due to a failure to state how 

 certain measurements were taken. This may 

 possibly explain why Dr. True finds the flukes 

 of the Newfoundland humpbacks wider than 

 in European specimens, quoting 15 feet 8 

 inches and 17 feet 2 inches for whales re- 

 spectively 42 and 45 feet long. A very ac- 

 curate measure of the flukes of a humpback 

 50 feet long, following the curve of the back, 

 gave a spread of only 13 feet 8 inches. It is 

 also probable that the flukes show a great 

 range of variation, as do the flippers. 



Chapter ten gives the conclusions based on 



