ORDER OF CETACEA. 
IS 
to tie a Dolphin by the tail” ( veulent Her tin Dauphin par la 
queue). 
It is principally with the assistance of this powerful tail that 
the Dolphin swims with such rapidity, and that it has gained for 
itself the title of “ sea-arrow ” {fleche de la mer). 
When these Cetaceans — which go in numerous troops, and in a 
certain order — meet with a ship, they follow it, so as to catch the 
fish which the refuse thrown from the ship attracts in quantities. 
At whatever speed the ship may be either sailing or steaming, 
they keep up with it, and play about among the waves, bounding, 
turning over and over, and never tiring of frisking and tumbling, 
affording continual amusement to the crew. Their leaps, their 
circumvolutions, their light manoeuvres, the prettiness of their 
form and colour, afford a recreation to navigators fatigued by the 
monotony of a long sea voyage. 
Many authors have said that the Dolphin leaps sometimes high 
enough above the surface of the water to jump on board small 
vessels. They say that in this case the animal curves its body 
round with force, bends its tail like a bow, and then unbends it, 
in such a manner as to flv like the arrow from a bow. 
When they saw these animals following their ships, the sailors 
imagined that they were accompanying them from an instinct of 
sociability ; they have even gone so far as to say that these 
animals had a sort of affection for seamen. Of course, these ideas 
are unfounded. 
One may read in the Traite de la Navigation , by P. Fournier, 
a curious anecdote respecting the Dolphin. On the 1st of Sep- 
tember, 1638, fifteen French galleys were preparing to engage 
in action with as many Spanish and Sicilian vessels, which had on 
board, besides the ordinary complement of rowers and sailors, 
3,500 foot soldiers. 
“ The orders received,” says P. Fournier, “ each one took his 
post, and the captain of the enemy was already in the midst of 
his fourteen galleys, when, behold, suddenly eighty or a hundred 
dolphins appeared on the water, and grouped themselves round 
the French captain, bounding on the waves, gliding from bow to 
stern, leaping towards the enemy, and playing a thousand antics 
which made all the crew break out incontinently into these joyous 
words — ‘ Vive le roi ! nous aurons du Dauphin ! 9 — taking this 
