86 
WHALE ROOM. 
harpoon often pierces the lungs or air-passages, and then 
fountains of blood inaj be forced high in the air through the 
blowholes, as commonly depicted in scenes of Arctic adventure; 
l)ut this is nothing more (allowance being made for the Whale^s 
peculiar mode of breathing) than what follows severe wounds 
of the lungs in other Mammals. 
AVhales and Dolphins prey upon living animal food ; but the 
Killer-Whales, Orca, alone eat other warm-blooded animals, as 
Seals, and even members of their own order, large and small. 
Many feed on fish, others on small floating crustaceans, minute 
molluscs, and jelly-fish ; while the principal food of many is 
constituted by various species of cuttlefishes, especially squid, 
which abound in some seas, where they form almost the entire 
support of some of the largest members of the order. 
In size the members of the group vary much, some of the 
smaller Dolphins scarcely exceeding four feet in length, while 
Whales are the most colossal of all animals. It is true that 
statements of their bulk are exaggerated, but even when 
reduced to their actual dimensions some of the existing Whales 
exceed in bulk ail animals of the present and nearly all those of 
past times. 
With some exceptions. Whales and Dolphins are timid in- 
offensive animals, active in their movements, and affectionate 
in disposition towards one another. This is especially the case 
with regard to the conduct of the mother towards her young, 
of which there is usually but one, and at most two, at a time. 
They are generally gregarious, swimming in herds or “ schools,’^ 
sometimes amounting to hundreds in number, though some 
species are met with singly or in ]>airs. 
The great commercial value of the oil which all the Cetacea 
yield, and the special products of certain species, such as whale- 
bone, spermaceti, &c., cause them to l)e subject to unremitting 
persecution, which has greatly diminished their numbers, and 
threatens some with extermination. 
The existing members of the order are separated into two 
suborders, showing important structural differences. These are 
the Toothed Whales or Odontoceti, and the Whalebone-Whales- 
or Mystacoceti. 
