36 
HABITS OF THE SPERM WHALE: 
the tongue is suddenly drawn into the mouth, and the 
many little animals which crowded upon it are disposed 
of “in one fell swoop.” 
That the mode mentioned above, by which the sperm 
whale acquires and secures its prey, is correct, I am led 
to believe also, from the following considerations. The 
sperm whale is subject to several diseases, one of which 
is a perfect, or imperfect, loss of sight. A whale per- 
fectly blind, was taken by Captain William Swain, of 
the Sarah and Elizabeth whaler of London, both eyes 
of which were completely disorganised, the orbits being 
occupied by fungous masses, protruding considerably, 
rendering it certain that the whale must have been 
deprived of vision for a long space of time ; yet, not- 
withstanding this, the animal was quite as fat, and pro- 
duced as much oil, as any other captured of the same 
size. Besides blindness, this whale is frequently sub- 
ject to deformity of the lower jaw : two instances of 
which I have seen myself, in which the deformity was so 
great as to render it impossible for the animal to find the 
jaws useful in catching small fish, or even, one might 
have supposed, in deglutition ; yet these whales pos- 
sessed as much blubber and were as rich in oil as any of 
a similar size I have seen before or since. 
In both these instances of crooked jaws, the nutrition 
of the animal appeared to be equally perfect; but the 
deformities were different in one case, the jaw being bent 
to the right side and rolled as it were like a scroll, in 
the other it was bent downwards, but also curved upon 
itself. It would be interesting here to inquire into the 
