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means equal. The whale, in lieu of arms offenflvc 

 and defenfive, has only his tail ; in order to ufe it 

 againft his enemy he dives with his head, and if the 

 b?ow takes place finifhes him at a ftroke but the 

 other, who is very adroit in fhunning it, immedi- 

 ately falls upon the whale, and buries his weapon in 

 his fides. And as he feldom pierces quite to the 

 bottom of the fat, does him no great damage ; 

 when the whale difcovers the other darting upon 

 him he dives, but the fword-fifh purfues him under 

 water, and obliges him to rife again to the furface ; 

 then the battle begins anew, and lafts till the fword- 

 fifh lofes fight of the whale, who makes a flying 

 fight of it, and is a better fwimmer than he on the 

 furface of the water. 



The Fkttau, or threfher, refembles a large plaice, 

 and what is called by the French fifhermen flet 9 ap- 

 pears to be the diminutive of this fifh. He is grey 

 on the back and white under the belly. His length 

 is generally from four to five feet, his breadth at 

 leaft two, and his thicknefs one. His head is very 

 thick, all of it exquifite and extremely tender ; from 

 the bones is extra&ed a juice which is preferable to 

 the fineft marrow. His eyes which are almoll: as 

 large as thofe of the fwordfilh, and the gills are 

 molt delicious morfels. The body is thrown into 

 the fea, to fatten^ the cod, to whom the threfher 

 is the moft dangerous enemy, and who makes but 

 one meal of three of thofe fifties. I {hall not trou- 

 ble your Grace with a defcription of all the fpecies 

 of birds which live on thofe feas, and that only by 

 fifhing, all of them being naturally fifhers, as feve- 

 ral travellers have already mentioned them, though 

 fheir accounts contain nothing worth notice. 



Qn 



