20 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



extremely large, and the water, as it rushed into it after his fall from tlie 

 bows of the vessel, must have produced great pain, for he instantly threw 

 himself upright in the air and uttered a heavy groan. It was evening, 

 and on no consideration our duty to go in search of him, nor to delay 

 our voyage a moment in order to settle speculative questions in Philo- 

 sophy, however interesting. The largest fish of this class, which I ever 

 saw, was about twenty miles from Cape Frio, in something more than 

 thirty fathoms water. We had disturbed it, for the creature rose directly 

 vmder the Bow-sprit; made one curve slowly, and then disappeared. 

 That part of the back which became exposed to view, was several yards 

 long ; its skin was rough and appeared full of tubercles, or wrinkled ; the 

 colour was cinerous, or blackish grey ; the shoulders filled up the whole 

 apparent breadth, to a person standing on the quarter-deck, between the 

 two Cat-heads of a brig of two hundred tons, and could not be less than 

 from two to three yards across. 



Some years ago, large shoals of the Bottle-nosed Porpoise had their 

 haunts about the lat. 24°. 30'. South, near to the coast of Brazil; but 

 they have lately disappeared. Perhaps, like the Whale, they have 

 been driven from those parts of the Ocean by the great increase of 

 navigation. 



Whales, though less common on the coast of Brazil than formerly, 

 are still found there ; and on a calm day, when the vessel hardly steered 

 for want of wind, she approached so close to one asleep upon the water, 

 that a passenger went over the side and pressed hard upon it with a 

 boat-hook. It seemed perfectly insensible to the touch, and to try its 

 sense of hearing, a carronade was fired ; upon which he plunged instantly 

 downwards. 



In lat. 18°. S. we fell in with a dead whale. Its enormous bulk 

 upon the water, for it floated high above the surface, gave rise to many 

 conjectures. When first seen, most on board thought it to be a vessel 

 dismasted. It was drifting before the wind, and from the mast we could 

 discern its wake, at least seven miles in length, bounded by two diverging 

 lines, whose junction was at the carcase. Between these lines the sea 



