142 
SOMERSET 
CHAP. 
the female none, and the grinders are the same as those 
of an ox ; it rises now and then like the porpoise to 
the surface to blow. The meat is very nourishing and 
tender, varying in taste according to the different 
portions ; some parts are like veal, others like pork or 
fish, and the oil tastes like pure melted butter, and is 
most fattening : for this purpose they are boiled down 
and the oil exported. 
An American writer has said, “ It is a dish of which 
Apicius might have been proud, and which the dis- 
criminating palate of Heliogabalus would have thought 
entitled to the most distinguished reward ” ; it belongs, 
like the whale, to the family of mammals, and is most 
human in its grief when its young are caught, sometimes 
fearlessly following the boats for miles with the most 
appealing look in its eyes. The young calf in the 
same way will follow its mother, crying out in the most 
heartrending way. 
There are alligators here too, but they are seldom 
seen. Mrs. Jardine talks calmly of killing a snake 16 
feet long. They grow to a very large size ; one that 
was killed had swallowed a wallaby weighing 57 lbs. 
and a wild pig 32 lbs. This is well vouched for and 
is no mere traveller’s tale. The snakes are sometimes 
most troublesome, killing fowls, dogs, or indeed any- 
thing they come across. One, 1 4 feet long, wound itself 
round Mr. Jardine one night. They had to cut it off him 
in three places before they could unwind it. He killed 
a brown snake here the other day measuring 12 feet 
in length, the largest I have ever heard of. 
The natives have remedies for the bites of different 
kinds. They are more afraid of the brown snake than 
any other, and, when bitten, pound up the leaves of a 
plant, a specimen of which I have painted, putting 
some on the wound and drinking a docoction of them. 
