426 



THE STRAND MAGAZINE, 



that they had not dissected the whale's 

 head carefully, because had they done so 

 they must have found that there was no 

 connection between the spout-hole and the 

 mouth, the air passage from the former going 

 direct to the lungs. But such a yarn is gifted 

 with amazing vitality. I was greatly amused 

 the other day, on glancing through a tho- 

 roughly absurd story by Jules Verne about 

 the Antarctic to find him talking of a 

 whale spouting a torrent of 

 water upon a schooner's deck, 

 alongside of which he rose. 

 It was described as a flood 

 which made men cling for 

 their lives to save themselves 

 from being washed overboard ! 

 Extravagance in fiction is 

 allowable, is necessary per- 

 haps ; but such ridiculous 

 travesty of the facts of natural 

 history as that must surely 

 be classed as unpardonable 

 ignorance. 



Now, the family life of Mr. 

 Cetus is extremely pretty and 

 homely. He does not, like 

 most other sea mammals 

 except seals, marry extensively, 

 generally resting content with 

 three or four wives at the 

 most. This may not be a 

 virtue on his part, but due 

 to the fact that, unlike any 

 other whales in existence, the 

 sexes are almost equal in size, 

 the balance, if any, being in 

 favour of the lady. They live 

 harmonious lives so far as 

 can be judged ; indeed, the 

 temper of these hugest of 

 all mammals is so placid 

 and equable that one doubts 

 whether they could quarrel, 

 is affectionate, nursing her 

 fully ; but, whether from constitutional 

 mildness or cowardice, she will not lash 

 herself into the blind fury that a bereaved 

 humpback whale will if her offspring happens 

 to be slain by her side. There are few 

 stranger sights to be witnessed anywhere 

 than that of a mother whale quietly reposing 

 her vast bulk just below the surface while 

 the calf, a playful little creature some fifteen 

 feet long, nuzzles at her ample bosom, drain- 

 ing it of its bountiful stores of thick, rich 

 milk. Like all young things the calf is very 

 playful, darting around its stolid mother in 

 many a mazy whul, rolling over her back and 



trying to entice her into a race, but at the first 

 hint of danger nestling close up to her side 

 beneath one of her fins, so as to be invisible 

 except for the tiny puff of condensed breath 

 it occasionally exhales into the clear air. 

 Besides being very timid and peaceful, the 

 mysticetae are cumbrous and slow in their 

 movements and soon tire. Their strength 

 must, of course, be immense, but the thick- 

 ness and weight of their top-coat of blubber 



NESTLING CLOSE Ul' TO HER SIDE BENEATH ONE OF HER KINS. 



The mother 

 young care- 



is so great that even that strength is insufficient 

 to keep them going for any length of time. 

 What the weight of blubber a full-grown cow 

 in good condition will carry has never, so far 

 as I know, been carefully calculated, but it 

 may, I think, safely be taken at double the 

 weight of the oil extracted from it. And 

 since I have myself seen twenty-one tuns of 

 oil boiled out of the blubber-coating of one 

 whale, that would give her a skin of forty-two 

 tons weight nearly. Their utmost speed, even 

 under the influence of pain and terror, 

 is never more than eight knots an hour, 

 and they are quite unable to " breach," or 

 leap into the air, as other whales do. In 

 fact, were it not for the ice under which they 



