140 
A VOYAGE TO SPITZBEBGEN. 
value of this ivory is considerable, and at one time the 
tooth of the narwhal had some reputation as a medi¬ 
cine. Master Pornet, in his “ Historie of Drugges,” 
gives some curious particulars respecting its qualities, 
and to the present day the tooth has a high medicinal 
value in the Chinese pharmacopoeia. In the palace of 
Rosenborg is a throne of the kings of Denmark manu¬ 
factured of this ivory, and the father of Captain 
Scoresby had the posts of his state-bed constructed out 
of the splendid teeth of this animal. The oil we know 
to be of value; and Dr. R. Brown, during his recent 
travels in Greenland, where he has gathered the most 
complete materials for the history of this and other 
Arctic animals, states that a jelly made from the skin 
of the narwhal is looked upon, and justly so, as one of 
the prime dainties of a Greenlander. The hospitable 
Danish ladies resident in that country always make a 
point of presenting a dish of “ mattak ” to their foreign 
visitors, who soon begin to like it. 
The narwhal is gregarious, generally travelling in 
great herds. We saw them going in flocks of many 
thousands, travelling north in their migrations tusk 
to tusk, and tail to tail, like a regiment of cavalry, 
so regularly do they seem to rise and sink into the 
water in their undulating movements as they swim. 
The use of the tusk has long been a matter in dis- 
