ANATOMY OF THE WHALE. 
151 
According to Cuvier, the brain in man varies from 
one thirty-first to one twenty-second part of his 
weight * ; whereas in this animal, the proportion 
of brain was only a three-thousandth part. 
The heart, which is of an oblong form, much 
compressed, resembles in colour and substance the 
heart of an ox. The breadth of it, in this speci¬ 
men, was 29 inches, the height 12, the thickness 9, 
and the weight of it 64 pounds. Diameter of the 
aorta about 6 inches. 
Large as the whale is in bulk, the throat is but 
narrow. In this animal, the diameter of the oeso¬ 
phagus, when fully distended, was scarcely 2* in¬ 
ches ; with difficulty admitting my hand. 
The epiglottis is a beautiful valve, formed al¬ 
most like the termination of the proboscis of an 
elephant. Though the larynx in the whale has 
a free communication with the mouth, as in qua¬ 
drupeds, yet the mysticetus does not appear to 
have any voice. In other cetacea, however, this 
is not always the case; some of the Dolphins, in 
particular, having been heard to emit a shrill 
* Lemons d’Anat. Comp. ii. p. 149- The proportion the 
human brain bears to the weight of the body, appears to be 
less on an average, than is stated by Cuvier. According to 
Haller, the proportion in a man of lGOlb. weight, is l-40th; 
in a man of 140 lb., l-35th ; and in a child, six years old, 
l-22d. 
