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Title: The seals and whales of the British seas
Author: Thomas Southwell
Release date: February 2, 2026 [eBook #77840]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Jarrold and Sons, 1881
Credits: deaurider, PrimeNumber and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEALS AND WHALES OF THE BRITISH SEAS ***
THE
SEALS AND WHALES
OF THE
BRITISH SEAS.
BY
THOMAS SOUTHWELL, F.Z.S.
_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS._
London:
JARROLD AND SONS, 3, PATERNOSTER BUILDINGS.
[_All Rights Reserved._]
1881.
INTRODUCTION.
SEALS AND WHALES OF THE BRITISH SEAS.
Although at no period entirely neglected, as is apparent from the
frequent reference to the subject by old authors, and from the known
richness in species of the British Fauna, compared with that of the
Continent of Europe, the study of the Marine Mammalia of the British
Seas has, of late years, received more than usual attention, and the
advance made in the knowledge of these creatures, has been rapid
in proportion. Nor is it surprising that, to the inhabitants of a
densely-peopled country like the British Isles, the terrestrial fauna
of which must, of necessity, be very restricted and familiar, the study
of the mammals frequenting its seas and shores should be possessed of a
peculiar charm. The uncertainty and rarity of their occurrence, their
exceptional forms, the mystery which shrouds their origin, heightened
by the romance which surrounds the seas and high latitudes forming the
chief home of so many species, must always render them objects of the
greatest interest. Not only is this the case on the coast, but even in
inland districts, whither--notably to London and Birmingham--Cetaceans
have been brought, both living and dead, at great expense, and from
long distances, to gratify the growing interest which has manifested
itself, in these remarkable animals.
Under these circumstances it is surprising that no modern book,
especially devoted to this subject, exists; those who would inform
themselves must search out the scattered records dispersed in the
publications of numerous Scientific Societies, or procure works, which,
excellent as they may be, are much more comprehensive in scope, and
too expensive to be within the reach of many into whose hands it is
hoped this little book may come: the author has, therefore, striven to
supply what is certainly a desideratum, viz., a cheap, plain, but, he
hopes, trustworthy treatise on the Marine Mammalia of the British Seas.
Originally published in the form of a series of papers in the pages of
_Science Gossip_, the following account of the “Seals and Whales found
in the British Seas” has been brought down to the present time, and
much new matter added, not the least important of which is that devoted
to the claims of the Atlantic Right-Whale to a place in the British
fauna.
Doubtless, rare specimens are often lost to science for want of
identification, and all those interested in their study have
experienced the frequent disappointment which attends the bare
announcement of “a Whale on shore:” in many instances no attempt is
made to determine the species, in others it is evidently wrongly-named,
or, although perhaps a more or less elaborate description may be given,
not a single feature is indicated by which it may be identified.
One special object in reproducing these pages is to assist, by means
of the most accurate figures which could be obtained, and short
descriptions of the more important characters to be observed in each
species, in determining those specimens which, from time to time, are
landed by our fishermen, or cast dead upon the shore. Elaborate or
technical descriptions have been carefully avoided, but short accounts
of the habits and distribution, so far as known, of each species have
been given, with the hope of interesting others in the study of this,
even now, too-much-neglected branch of Natural History.
To the more advanced student the numerous references may be useful for
indicating the sources whence detailed information of a more technical
character is to be obtained.
The usefulness of this little manual, which pretends to no originality,
but in the compilation of which no labour has been spared to insure
accuracy, will, it is hoped, be greatly enhanced by the Illustrations;
they were either engraved from original drawings, or copied from the
most trustworthy sources (indicated in the text); several of them have
since been adopted by the latest publications on the subject, both in
England and America. For the use of 20 of the illustrations, out of a
total of 29, the author is indebted to the kindness of Mr. David Bogue,
who obligingly lent the blocks originally engraved for the papers in
_Science Gossip_.
The author has to acknowledge, with many thanks, the kind assistance
afforded him by MR. J. W. CLARK, Superintendent of the Museum of the
University of Cambridge, and a recognized authority on the _Cetacea_
and _Pinnipedia_. He, also, has to record the services, in behalf of
this little work, rendered by one, who, beloved and lamented by many
friends, has passed away since it has been in the press--the late MR.
EDWARD RICHARD ALSTON. The wound inflicted by the early death of that
amiable and promising naturalist is too fresh to admit of further
reference.
_Norwich, March 1881._
INDEX.
PAGE.
Atlantic Right-Whale, 61
_Balæna biscayensis_, 61
” _mysticetus_, 49
_Balænoptera boops_, 70
” _borealis_ (Note), 128
” _laticeps_, 77
” _musculus_, 70
” _rostrata_, 78
” _sibbaldii_, 75
Beaked Whale, 101
Beluga ”, 108
Bottle-head ”, 101
Bottle-nose Dolphin, 124
Broad-fronted Beaked Whale, 101
Cachelot, 85
Cetacea, 44
Cuvier’s Whale, 102
_Cystophora cristata_, 24
_Delphinapterus leucas_, 108
_Delphinus acutus_, 125
” _albirostris_, 125
” _deductor_, 118
” _delphis_, 121
” _globiceps_, 118
” _melas_, 118
” _phocœna_, 120
” _tursio_, 124
Dolphin, Bottle-nosed, 124
” Common, 121
” Risso’s, 115
” White-beaked, 125
” White-sided, 125
_Epiodon desmarestii_, 102
_Globicephalus melas_, 118
Grampus, Common, 113
” Risso’s, 115
_Grampus cuvieri_, 115
” _griseus_, 115
Greenland Right-Whale, 49
_Halichœrus gryphus_, 28
Hump-backed Whale, 69
_Hyperoodon butzkopf_, 101
” _latifrons_, 101
” _rostratum_, 101
_Lagenorhynchus acutus_, 125
” _albirostris_, 125
_Megaptera longimana_, 69
_Mesoplodon sowerbiensis_, 105
_Monodon monoceros_, 106
Mystacoceti, 49
Narwhal, 106
Odontoceti, 85
_Orca gladiator_, 113
_Phoca baikalensis_, 17
” _discolor_, 17
” _grœnlandica_, 21
” _hispida_, 14
” _vitulina_, 11
_Phocœna communis_, 120
_Physalus antiquorum_, 70
” _latirostris_, 75
_Physeter macrocephalus_, 85
Pilot Whale, 118
Pinnipedia, 2
Porpoise, 120
_Pseudorca crassidens_, 114
Risso’s Grampus, 115
Rorqual, Common, 70
” Lesser, 78
” Rudolphi’s, 77
” ” (Note), 128
” Sibbald’s, 75
_Rorqualus minor_, 78
Seal, Common, 11
” Greenland, 21
” Grey, 28
” Hooded, or Bladder-nosed, 24
” Ringed, or Marbled, 14
_Sibbaldius borealis_, 75
Sowerby’s Whale, 105
Sperm Whale, 85
_Trichechus rosmarus_, 32
_Tursio truncatus_, 124
Walrus, 32
Whale, Atlantic Right, 61
” Beaked, 101
” Bottle-head, 101
” Broad-fronted, 101
” Cuvier’s, 102
” Greenland Right, 49
” Humpbacked, 69
” Pilot, 118
” Sowerby’s, 105
” Sperm, 85
” White, 108
White-sided Dolphin, 125
White-beaked Dolphin, 125
Ziphioid Whales, 98
_Ziphius cavirostris_, 102
ERRATA.
Page 77, bottom line, for _Physalis_ read _Physalus_.
” 126, for _alberostris_ read _albirostris_.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE.
_Figure_ 1.--HIND FLIPPERS OF RINGED SEAL 2
” 2.--SKELETON OF SEAL 12
” 3.--RINGED OR MARBLED SEAL 15
” 4.--GREENLAND SEAL 20
” 5.--HOODED SEAL 25
” 6.--GREY SEAL 29
” 7.--WALRUS 33
” 8.--_Vacca Marina_ 37
” 9.--HEAD OF WALRUS 39
” 10.--SEA HORSE (after Cook) 41
” 11.--SECTION OF SKULL OF WHALEBONE WHALE 46
” 12.--GREENLAND RIGHT-WHALE 51
” 13.--ATLANTIC RIGHT-WHALE 60
” 14.--COMMON RORQUAL 71
” 15.--LESSER RORQUAL 80
” 16.--SPERM WHALE 84
” 17.--CHAIR IN GREAT YARMOUTH CHURCH 87
” 18.--BACK VIEW OF DITTO, DITTO 87
” 19.--SKELETON OF SPERM WHALE 88
” 20.--SKULL OF DITTO 90
” 21.--HEAD OF SOWERBY’S WHALE 104
” 22.--BELUGA, CAUGHT BY THE TAIL 109
” 23.--GRAMPUS 112
” 24.--_Pseudorca crassidens_ 114
” 25.--RISSO’S DOLPHIN 116
” 26.--PILOT WHALE 118
” 27.--COMMON DOLPHIN 122
” 28.--BOTTLE-NOSED DOLPHIN 124
” 29.--WHITE-BEAKED DOLPHIN 126
* * * * *
TABLE OF BRITISH CETACEA 48
” DIFFERENCES OF BRITISH MYSTACOCETI 82
SEALS AND WHALES
OF THE
BRITISH SEAS.
The two great groups of Marine Mammals known as _Pinnipedia_ and
_Cetacea_, although widely separated from each other zoologically,
naturally present themselves to us side by side as inhabiting the
same regions; the facilities for studying the one are also equally
favourable for obtaining a knowledge of the other. It is remarkable
that in few groups of the animal world, until recently, has so much
confusion existed as in the Seals and Whales. This has, of late years,
through the labours of European and American naturalists, to some
extent been remedied, although very much still remains to be done, the
literature of the subject being still so scattered, that much of it is
inaccessible to the ordinary student. The arrangement and nomenclature
adopted in the following short account of the Seals and Whales
inhabiting or occurring in the seas, or on the shores, surrounding the
British Islands, is that used by Mr. Alston in the second edition of
Bell’s ‘British Quadrupeds.’
PINNIPEDIA.
The _Pinnipedia_ (fin-footed) forms a well-marked sub-order of the
Carnivora, and may be divided into three distinct families--the
_Phocidæ_, or true Seals; the _Trichechidæ_, represented by one species
only--the Walrus; and the _Otariidæ_, or Eared Seals.
[Illustration: Fig. 1. HIND FLIPPERS OF RINGED SEAL (_after Murie_).
=A=, opened out; =B=, closed.]
The _Phocidæ_ are found both in the Northern and Southern hemispheres,
most plentifully in the cold regions, but extending into the temperate
seas; in the Northern hemisphere they are found as far south as 40° N.
latitude; two species, however, are said to be sub-tropical. The true
Seals may readily be distinguished by the absence of external ears,
and the position of the posterior limbs, which are not adapted for
progression on land, but admirably suited for propelling the animal
through the element in which it obtains its sustenance. These limbs are
directed backwards, and compressed laterally, the soles of the flippers
being turned inwards, and are only free from the ankle-joints. (Fig.
1). Like the whole group, the Seals are carnivorous. Five species are
believed to have occurred on our shores.
The family of _Trichechidæ_ is limited to one genus, and that
consisting of only one species, the Walrus or Morse, which is
essentially Arctic in its habitat, and on our coasts can only be
regarded as a very rare and accidental straggler; in this animal there
is no external ear; its limbs are adapted for raising the body from the
ground, thus enabling it to progress by their means upon dry land.
The third family, _Otariidæ_, consists of several genera and species
(according to Gray); they are distinguished from both _Phocidæ_ and
_Trichechus_ by the presence of external ear-conchs, and from the
former by the structure of their limbs, which are free and adapted for
progression upon land, where at a certain season they take up their
abode for a considerable period. Dr. Pettigrew also points out that the
fore-feet are hardly used by the true Seals as means of propulsion in
the water, whereas in the Eared Seals they form the chief organs used
for that purpose, and in the Walrus all four limbs are employed. The
Eared Seals inhabit the lonely shores and islands of the Pacific Ocean
and South Seas, where they are hunted for their skins; the beautiful
“seal-skin” of commerce, so much prized for its lustre and softness,
being the dyed and prepared under-fur of some members of this family.
The _Otariidæ_ are not represented in our fauna.
The true Seals spend most of their time in the water, but visit the
shore or ice to bask in the sun or bring forth their young; this last
takes place early in the summer, and it is seldom that more than one is
produced at a birth. Some species enter the water almost immediately
after birth, but others are two or three weeks before they leave the
ice, quitting it at first very unwillingly, but soon becoming expert
at swimming and diving. The power of the Seal to remain beneath the
water for lengthened periods Dr. Wallace[1] believes to be acquired
rather than structural. Their food consists of crustacea and fish, with
an occasional sea-bird. Some species are migratory in their habits.
In disposition they are usually timid and gentle, and capable of
attachment, when in confinement, to those who feed and attend them. The
Bladder-nose and Grey Seals, however, appear to be exceptions to this
rule; the former is said to be fierce and vindictive, rather courting
than fleeing from danger, and altogether a formidable opponent. Their
great affection for their young is made use of by the sealers for their
destruction.
Although Seals are not found in sufficient numbers round our own
coast to be of any commercial value, in the Northern Seas, where they
congregate in vast numbers at the breeding season, the seal-fishery is
of great importance as a branch of industry, and finds employment for
a large number of vessels and men, both from this country and from the
ports of Northern Europe. In the Greenland seal-fishery the Norwegian
whalers had in 1874 sixteen steamers and nineteen sailing-ships, with
an aggregate tonnage of 9,000 tons, manned by 1,600 sailors, and in the
three years ending 1874 they killed 142,500 young Seals and 128,000 old
ones, notwithstanding which the balance-sheet of the three years showed
only a small profit on the steamers and a large loss on the sailing
vessels.[2] An official return issued by Messrs. David Bruce and Co.,
of Dundee, shows that in the season of 1879, eleven Dundee ships and
five from Peterhead, were engaged in the Greenland seal-trade; the
total catch of these sixteen ships was 35,044 Seals; four ships from
Dundee visited Newfoundland and captured 70,355 Seals, making a total
for the British ships alone of 105,399 Seals, exclusive of those
wounded and lost, or otherwise destroyed. These produced 1280 tons of
oil, worth about £25 per ton, or £32,000, exclusive of skins, which
sell for about 5s. each. The majority of the Norwegian vessels also
bring their cargoes to this country. Captain David Gray informs me that
the seal-fishery was commenced from the Port of Peterhead, in the year
1819, since which time to the close of the season of 1879, the large
number of 1,673,052 Seals have been taken by the vessels belonging to
that port. The Dundee vessels did not take part in the seal-fishery
till the year 1860, but have from that time to 1879 taken 917,278
Seals. This total is greatly swollen by the results of the Newfoundland
fishery; four Dundee vessels in 1879 took 70,355 Seals in Newfoundland,
whereas, in the same season, eleven Dundee and five Peterhead vessels
took only 35,044 Seals in the Greenland fishery. The Dundee ships,
after the Newfoundland fishery is ended, generally land their oil and
skins at St. John’s, and proceed on their whaling voyage to Greenland
and Davis’ Straits.
Dr. Wallace[3] estimates the annual produce of the Greenland
Seal-fishery alone at the sum of £116,000; the bulk of the seals taken
are the Harp Seal (_Phoca grœnlandica_).
Several attempts had been made to establish a seal-fishery at
Newfoundland, from the port of Dundee, but with small success till
the year 1876: in that year Messrs. Alexander Stephen and Son secured
premises at St. John’s, and sent out two vessels to be manned chiefly
by a Newfoundland crew; the result was a great success, and this firm
has since prosecuted the fishing with very satisfactory results. The
Dundee Seal and Whale Fishing Company have also three steamers in
the trade, in addition to those engaged at the Greenland fishery.
Mr. David Bruce, of Dundee, to whom I am indebted for the above
particulars, informs me that the season of 1880 was a failure in the
Newfoundland fishery, and that out of a fleet of twenty-four steamers,
not more than six of them would pay their expenses.
Mr. J. A. Allen[4] gives an interesting account of the rise and
progress of the Newfoundland fishery, which he characterises as “the
sealing-ground, _par excellence_, of the world, twice as many Seals
being taken here by the Newfoundland fleet alone as by the combined
sealing-fleets of Great Britain, Germany, and Norway, in the icy seas
about Jan Mayen, or the so-called ‘Greenland Sea’ of the whalemen and
sealers.” So early as 1721, thousands of “sea-wolves” were killed
in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but, according to Mr. Michael Carroll,
of Bonavista, Newfoundland, in his account of the ‘Seal and Herring
Fisheries of Newfoundland,’ published in 1873, as quoted by Mr. Allen,
it was not till the year 1763 that the seal-fishery was regularly
prosecuted there by vessels specially equipped for the purpose. The
trade, however, rapidly assumed importance, and in 1807 thirty vessels
from Newfoundland alone were engaged in it. In 1834 the Newfoundland
fleet had increased to three hundred and seventy-five, besides a
considerable number of vessels from Nova Scotia and the Magdalen
Islands; in 1857 the number of vessels employed appears to have reached
its maximum, exceeding three hundred and seventy, whilst the catch of
Seals was estimated at 500,000. About the year 1866, steamships were
first introduced, and have ever since been increasingly employed; the
result has been a steady decrease in the number of vessels, which,
in 1871, were reduced to one hundred and forty-six sailing vessels
and fifteen steamers, or less than one-half, but the number of Seals
taken annually, up to 1873, appears to have remained about the same,
and, notwithstanding the enormous destruction of these creatures,
which takes place every season on the Newfoundland sealing grounds,
many thousands of which, from the wasteful methods employed in their
capture, are never accounted for, Mr. Carroll is still of opinion that
up to the year 1873, their numbers were actually on the increase: this
can hardly continue much longer to be the case.
I will only mention one of the methods employed by the Newfoundland
sealers, which must eventually be attended with the most disastrous
effects. This mode is technically called “panning.” Mr. Carroll,
writing in 1871 says, “No greater injury can possibly be done to the
seal-fishery than that of bulking Seals on pans of ice by crews of
ice-hunters. Thousands of Seals are killed and bulked, and never seen
afterwards. When the men come up with a large number of old and young
Seals, that cannot get into the water, owing to the ice being in one
solid jam, they drive them together, selecting a pan surrounded with
rafted ice, on which thousands of Seals are placed one over the other,
perhaps fifteen feet deep. A certain number of men is picked out by the
ship-master to pelt and put on board the bulked Seals, whilst other
men are sent to kill more. It often happens that the men are obliged
to go from one to ten miles, before they come up with the Seals again,
and very often the men pile from five hundred to two thousand in each
bulk, which bulks are from one to two miles apart; care is also taken
that flags are stuck up as a guide to direct the men where to find such
bulked Seals. So uncertain is the weather, and precarious the shifting
about of the ice, as well as heavy falls of snow and drift, that very
often such bulked Seals are never seen again by the men that killed
and bulked them, as the vessels and steamships are frequently driven
by gales of wind far out of sight or reach of them, and frequently
wheeled or driven into another spot, when the men again commence
killing and bulking as before. In many instances it has happened that
the crews of vessels, as well as the crews of steamships, have killed
and bulked twice their load. No doubt Seals that are bulked are
often picked up by the crews of other vessels, but such is the law,
that as long as the flags are erected upon the bulks, and the vessel
or steamship is in sight, no man can take them, notwithstanding the
vessel’s or steamship’s men that bulked them may be ten miles away from
them, whilst another vessel may be driven within a quarter of a mile
of thousands of bulked Seals, but, owing to the law, dare not take
them.” The skins, if left, are also liable to injury by the frost or
sun, or by the capsizing of the pan they may be totally lost. In the
spring of 1872, some five thousand Seals, obtained to the westward of
Bonavista, by the inhabitants of that place, were heaped upon the ice.
“There were thirteen flags to be seen in the morning over bulked Seals,
and when the drift ice struck the land in the evening, only six of the
flags were visible, the ice having rafted over both flags and Seals.
Some days after, when the ice moved off from the shore, several bulks
of Seals were found, but in such a putrid state that they could not be
handled.”[5] Comment upon the consequences which must speedily result
from such lamentable waste of life is needless.
Nor, until very recently, was the seal-fishery in the Greenland Seas
prosecuted with any greater regard to humanity or economy. “Supposing
the sealing prosecuted with the same vigour as at present,” says Dr.
Brown, “I have little hesitation in stating that before thirty years
shall have passed away, the seal-fishery, as a source of commercial
revenue, will have come to a close, and the progeny of the immense
number of Seals now swimming about in Greenland waters will number
but comparatively few.” Dr. Brown’s remarks were written in the year
1868, and the prediction is already virtually fulfilled: a report,
giving an account of the success of the Dundee vessels employed in
the Newfoundland seal-fishery in 1877, after stating that 39,000
Seals were said to have been captured by two vessels, concludes
thus:--“Previously all Dundee vessels were employed at the _Greenland_
seal-fishing, but Captain Adams has for some years been of opinion
that _that ground is practically used up_, and hence his visit to
Newfoundland.”
I will spare the reader, as much as possible, a repetition of the
horrors of this cruel trade, and make only a single quotation from a
letter written by an old and experienced sealer, Captain David Gray, of
the steamship _Eclipse_. He says that five ships in 1873 shot among the
old Seals for four days until the pack was utterly ruined. “I suppose,”
he continues, “about 10,000 old Seals had been taken. Add 20 per cent.
for Seals mortally wounded and lost, gives an aggregate of 12,000 old
ones; add 12,000 young ones which died of starvation (their parents
being killed before the young ones were of any value or able to shift
for themselves), gives 24,000 ... The whole of the young brood was
destroyed, and had these Seals been left alone for eight or ten days,
I am quite within the mark when I say that, instead of only taking 300
tons of oil out of them, 1,500 could as easily have been got, and that
without touching an old one.”[6] So great are the cruelties perpetrated
by the crews of the sealers, that even the men themselves, hardened as
they are, sicken at the work, and cry shame that the law does not put
a stop to them. Let anybody who cares to know what fearful cruelties
man is capable of perpetrating for gain, read Captain Gray’s letter.
As a remedy for this waste of life (of course its cruelties can only
be modified) Captain Gray suggested that the ships should be kept from
sailing before the 25th of March, about a month later than they then
started; they would then not reach the fishery and find the young
Seals until they were sufficiently grown to be worth killing, and the
frightful waste of life which occurred from the destruction of the
old Seals before the young ones were able to shift for themselves,
resulting in the death from starvation of the whole brood, thus be put
a stop to.
With this object in view, an Act was passed in 1875, in which the
Foreign States interested concurred, prohibiting the killing of the
Seals before the 3rd of April in each year; from some misunderstanding
this Act was not enforced in the season of 1876, but in 1877 it was
rigidly observed by the ships of all nations engaged in the fishery.
The result of the season’s fishing was very unsatisfactory, owing to
the absence of the large bodies of Seals which formerly were met with.
Captain Gray, after three years’ experience of the operation of this
Act, considers that the fishing still opens too early,[7] and that an
additional three days are necessary to enable the young Seals to arrive
at their best, and prevent the useless slaughter of the old ones, which
are getting thin from being suckled. He is of opinion that, since the
introduction of the close time, the Greenland Seals are not diminishing
quite so rapidly as they were, but that the restriction has not been in
operation long enough to form a very accurate opinion.
The Walrus is even more rapidly and surely becoming exterminated than
the Seal; it has become extinct from station after station, and but
for its ice-loving habits, which render its present strongholds always
difficult and sometimes impossible of access, it would now probably,
like Steller’s Rhytina, have to be spoken of in the past tense.
THE COMMON SEAL.
This species, _Phoca vitulina_, of Linnæus, is, _par excellence_, the
COMMON SEAL of the British waters. It is found, although in greatly
reduced numbers, on unfrequented shores and sands, from the Orkney and
Shetland Islands, where it most abounds, to Cornwall, occasionally
ascending estuaries and rivers for a considerable distance, but never
quitting the immediate vicinity of the water. According to Bell, it
occurs on both sides the North Atlantic, and is common in Spitzbergen,
Greenland, and Davis’s Straits; also Northern Russia, Scandinavia,
Holland, and France, and is said to occur occasionally in the
Mediterranean.[8] It figures largely in the returns of the Danish and
Greenland fishery, where the number killed annually of this species and
_Ph. hispida_ is estimated by Dr. Brown at about 70,000.
Low, who died in 1795, says in the ‘Fauna Oncadensis,’ “A ship commonly
goes from this place once a-year to Soliskerry, and seldom returns
without 200 or 300 Seals;” these they killed by landing on the rock,
and knocking them on the head. He also says that in North Ronaldsha
they take them for the purpose of eating, and that the inhabitants
say “they make good ham.” Though at present far less numerous than
formerly, it is still abundant in the unfrequented bays and sounds
of the Orkney and Shetland Islands; also, on the Hebrides. On the
mainland, Mr. Alston (‘Fauna of Scot.’ _Proc. Glasgow Nat. Hist. Soc._)
says it is found in all localities where it is free from intrusion,
especially on the North and West shores; it is also common on some
parts of the Irish Coast. In Wales it is not uncommon, and on the
Cornish, and some few other favoured localities of the English coast
it is still well known; on other parts of our shores it is decidedly
rare. In the great estuary between the Norfolk and Lincolnshire coasts,
called the “Wash,” this species frequents the sand-banks left dry at
low water, and, doubtless, many young ones are produced there annually.
At birth, which takes place about the month of June, the young Seal is
covered with a coat of white woolly hair, which is shed in parturition,
or shortly after, and the young one takes to the water when only a
few hours old. Mr. Bartlett gives an account of the birth of a young
one (at the time believed to be _Ph. hispida_) in the Zoological
Gardens,[9] and states that it completely divested itself of its coat
of fur and hair in a few minutes, and was swimming and diving about
within three hours of its birth; its mother turned on her side to let
it suck, and its voice was a low, soft “ba.” The first coat is not shed
so quickly in some species, nor do they all take to the water at so
early an age; as, for example, _Ph. grœnlandica_, which is two or three
weeks before it leaves the ice.
[Illustration: Fig. 2. SKELETON OF SEAL.]
The total length of the adult is about 4 to 5 feet, and its coat is
generally of a yellowish colour, thickly spotted with black on the back
and upper parts, but less distinctly so on the sides. The under parts
are a bright silvery hue; there is, however, considerable variety in
colour and in the distinctness of the spots. This species is readily
domesticated, and displays great intelligence, and even affection for
those who feed and tend it. Almost everybody must have been struck with
the docility displayed by the Seals which are occasionally exhibited
as “talking fish.” At the Zoological Gardens and at the Brighton and
other Aquaria, where they are a never-failing source of attraction,
their graceful movements in their confined homes cannot fail to excite
admiration. Swimming silently and swiftly along, the animal threads
with the greatest accuracy the intricacies of its narrow pond, assuming
every possible attitude, and turning over and over in its course,
as much at ease when swimming on its back as in its usual position.
When, tired with this exercise, it comes to the edge of its pond and
raises itself out of the water, its rounded head, and bright, full
black eyes have something almost human in their expression, and the
fabled “mermaid” seems a reality; but when once it leaves the water,
it is clearly seen that it is no longer in the element in which it is
destined to live and move, for its motions are laboured and awkward
in the extreme. It throws itself along, first on one side and then
on the other, just as a man tightly sewn in a sack would do, but,
notwithstanding its clumsiness, contrives to make considerable progress.
This species may be distinguished by the arrangement of its molar
teeth, which are placed obliquely along either side of the jaw, not
in a line with each other. It has been said that this is only a
characteristic of youth, and that the peculiar arrangement disappears
“before the skull attains its maximum size.” In the second edition of
Bell’s ‘Quadrupeds,’ however, the authors express their belief that
“it will be found a characteristic of all ages, although certainly
more marked in the young than in very old animals.” Dr. Brown says
that the Greenland Seal (_Ph. grœnlandica_) in its second coat has
often been mistaken for this species, but that the former may readily
be distinguished by its having the second toe of the fore flipper the
longest. The hair next the skin is short and woolly, but externally
harsh and shining, admirably adapted for repelling the water in
which the animal passes so much of its time; the whiskers with which
the upper lip is furnished, are thick, flattened hairs, laterally
compressed, presenting diamond-shaped inequalities: this form of
bristle is found in all the British Seals, whereas _Phoca barbata_, a
species shortly to be mentioned as of doubtful occurrence on our coast,
has the bristles compressed, but smooth. The food of the Common Seal
consists of fish and crustacea.
THE RINGED, OR MARBLED SEAL.
The only recorded instance of the occurrence of the RINGED SEAL, _Phoca
hispida_, of Schreber, on the British coast, is that of an individual
captured on the Norfolk coast, in June, 1846, and purchased by Mr.
J. H. Gurney, in the flesh, in the Norwich fish-market, the skull of
which is now in the Museum of that city. Although no other instance
of its occurrence is on record, it seems not improbable that it may
occasionally be met with, and pass unrecognized. In the first volume
of the ‘Magazine of Zoology and Botany,’ Mr. Wilson, in a paper on the
Scottish Seals, speaks of a small Seal which was sometimes seen in the
Hebrides, and believed by the natives to be a distinct species: this
was rendered probable by their not associating with the Common Seals,
and not being so wild in their nature. It is thought that this small
Seal may have been _Ph. hispida_. Small dark-coloured Seals have more
than once been seen on the Norfolk and Lincolnshire coast, or exhibited
in the towns, which it is quite possible also may have belonged to this
species. That it inhabited the coast of Scotland in the past, there is
evidence in the abundance of the remains of this species found in the
glacial clays of that country, as identified by Professor Turner.[10]
[Illustration: Fig. 3. RINGED SEAL (_Phoca hispida_).]
The small Seal found in the inland fresh-waters of Lake Baikal is
believed to be a variety of this species, differing only in its darker
colour; it has, however, been separated, under the name of _Ph.
baikalensis_ by M. Dybowski (_Arch. f. Anat. u. Phys._, 1873, p. 109).
The type of _Ph. discolor_, F. Cuv., was taken in the Channel, and,
according to De Sélys-Longchamps, this species has also occurred on the
Belgian coast.
At present its home is the high latitudes of the Arctic seas,
especially parallels 76 and 77 deg. North, and many are killed in
South Greenland. In Davis’s Straits it is found all the year round,
particularly up the ice-fjords; in Cumberland Gulf it is said to
be by far the most common Seal, and forms the principal food of
the Esquimaux. This was the only species found by the late Arctic
expedition north of Cape Union, 82° 15′ N. lat. Captain Feilden, the
Naturalist to Sir G. Nares’ Arctic Expedition, in an account of the
‘Mammalia of North Greenland and Grinnell Land’ (_Zoologist_, 1877,
p. 359), thus speaks of this species:--“The Ringed Seal was met with
in most of the bays we entered during our passage up and down Smith
Sound. It was the only species seen north of Cape Union, and which
penetrates into the Polar Sea. Lieutenant Aldrich, R.N., during his
autumn sledging, in 1875, noticed a single example in a pool of water
near Cape Joseph Henry, and a party which I accompanied in September,
1875, secured one in Dumbell Harbour, some miles north of the winter
quarters of the “Alert”: its stomach contained remains of crustaceans
and annelids. In June of the following year I observed three or four
of these animals on the ice of Dumbell Harbour. They had made holes in
the bay ice that had formed in this protected inlet. The polar pack was
at this time of the year firmly wedged against the shores of Grinnell
Land, and so tightly packed in Robeson Channel that no Seal could by
any possibility have worked its way into this inlet from outside. I am,
therefore, quite satisfied that _Phoca hispida_ is resident throughout
the year in the localities mentioned. A female killed on the 23rd
August, 1876, weighed 65 lbs.” This species has, therefore, probably
the most northerly habitat of any existing mammal.
Dr. Brown, in his paper on the ‘Greenland Seals’ (_Proc. Zool. Soc._,
June, 1868,) gives an interesting account of this species, which,
like the preceding, is littoral in its habits, seldom frequenting
the open sea, but found generally in the neighbourhood of the coast
ice, in retired situations. It is known by the whalers as the “Floe
rat,” and its food consists of various species of crustacea and small
fishes. This is the smallest of the Northern Seals, and of very little
commercial value: its flesh, however, is eaten, and its skin forms the
chief material of clothing in Greenland.
In appearance, this species is very like the Common Seal; but it is
darker in colour, more particularly on the back, and the spots in the
adult are surrounded by oval-shaped whitish rings; the young ones are
lighter in colour. The old male is said to emit a most disgusting
smell: hence one of its specific names, “fœtida.” Dr. Rink says that
this unpleasant odour is more developed in those which are captured
in the interior ice-fjords, “which are also, on an average perhaps,
twice as large as those generally occurring off the outer shores.
When brought into the hut, and cut up on its floor, such a Seal emits
a smell resembling something between that of assafœtida and onions,
almost insupportable to strangers. This peculiarity is not noticeable
in the younger specimens, or those of a smaller size, such as are
generally caught, and at all events the smell does not detract from the
utility of the flesh over the whole of Greenland.”[11]
[Illustration: Fig. 4. GREENLAND SEAL (_Phoca grœnlandica_).
Adult and Immature.]
The molar teeth in this species are arranged in a straight line along
the jaws, and not obliquely, as in the common species. As this Seal is
very likely to pass unnoticed, should it occur on our coast, it will
be well to bear in mind that this arrangement of the molars will at
once distinguish it from _Ph. vitulina_, the only species with which
it is likely to be confounded. Professor Flower has given a minute
description of the skull of the Norfolk specimen in the ‘_Proc. Zool.
Soc._’ for 1871, pp. 506-12. The figure of this species is copied from
Karl Thorin’s ‘Grundlinier Zoologiens Studium,’ p. 53 (Stockholm, 1868).
THE GREENLAND SEAL.
The claims of the GREENLAND SEAL, _Phoca grœnlandica_ (Fab.), to a
place in the British Fauna, although long considered highly probable,
were not rendered perfectly conclusive until 1874, when they were
satisfactorily established by Professor Turner’s identification of a
Seal killed in January, 1868, near the viaduct on the Lancaster and
Ulverstone Railway, and now preserved in the Kendal Museum. Professor
Turner (‘_Journal of Anatomy and Physiology_,’ vol. ix. p. 163) says
that he has himself examined this specimen, and found the dentition
exactly to agree with that of the skulls of the Greenland Seals with
which he compared it. The individual in question, a male, measured six
feet from the tip of the nose to the “point of the hind toes,” and the
colour indicated the age to be about three years. Previously to this,
the claims of this species to a place in our list rested principally
upon the skulls of two Seals killed in the Severn, and exhibited by
Dr. Reilly at the meeting of the British Association at Bristol in
1836. These skulls were at first referred by Professor Nilsson to
_Ph. hispida_, but afterwards, both by that gentleman and Professor
Bell, determined to belong to _Ph. grœnlandica_. Doubts having been
thrown on the accuracy of this decision, Professor Bell, in the second
edition of his ‘British Quadrupeds’ p. 253, again states his belief
that he was correct in assigning them to the young of this species.
These specimens are unfortunately lost. Several supposed cases of the
occurrence of this species are recorded, but in no instance were they
supported by the production of the animal itself. Dr. Saxby (‘_Zool._’
1864) says that this Seal is not rare in bad weather in the Voe of
Baltasound, Shetland; and Mr. H. Evans, of Darnley Abbey, Derbyshire,
in the year 1856, shot what he believes to have been a Greenland Seal
near Roundstone, county Galway,--“Unfortunately, the animal sank and
was lost; but Mr. Evans, who is well acquainted with the common and
grey species, is perfectly certain that it was quite different from
either” (Bell, 2 edit., p. 254). Perhaps the best authenticated case of
the supposed occurrence of this species on our shores is given by Mr.
H. D. Graham in Part I., vol. i. of the ‘Proceedings of the Nat. Hist.
Society of Glasgow,’ p. 53 (Feb. 24, 1863). Three large white Seals
were seen by Mr. Graham in Loch Tabert, Jura, Western Isles, lying on
some shelving rocks, about 300 or 400 yards from the shore. They were
watched through an excellent deer-stalking telescope for three hours,
and Mr. Graham states that the characteristic markings of the Harp Seal
could be distinctly seen. He also believes that, in three authentic
instances, captures of _white_ Seals, of extraordinary size, had been
made, and states some particulars of the habits and appearance of these
animals, as communicated to him by the islanders--to whom they appear
to have been well known,--which render it highly probable that they
belonged to this species. Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown[12] also saw four
Seals, which he believes to have been of this species, on a rock in
the Sound of Harris, on May 2nd, 1870. They took to the water, but
as they “kept close in, and often rushed past within a few feet” of
where he and his companion were standing, they had an excellent view of
them, and “the large splashy-looking dark marks on either side of the
back” were distinctly visible. Although essentially an Arctic species,
this animal has a very wide geographical range, which, added to its
migratory habits, renders it not at all improbable that individuals
occasionally wander to our shores.
This species is a native of the Arctic Ocean, and ranges from the
N.E. coast of America to the Kara Sea (where it was found by the
Swedish Arctic Expedition in 1875), changing its quarters according to
season.[13] It is this species which constitutes the chief object of
pursuit in the northern Seal-fishery, and the season chosen for the
attack is when they visit the ice for the purpose of producing their
young ones. Dr. Brown says, “They take to the ice, to bring forth
their young, generally between the middle of March and the middle of
April, according to the state of the season, &c., the most common time
being about the end of March. At this time they can be seen literally
covering the frozen waste, with the aid of a telescope, from the
‘crow’s-nest,’ at the main royal mast-head, and have on such occasions
been calculated to number upwards of half a million of males and
females.”[14] The young, when born, are pure white, which changes to
a yellow tint. At about 14 days old they begin to take to the water,
and at the age of a month are capable of taking care of themselves:
they then assume a spotted coat, which changes gradually to the adult
markings, which are perfected in about three years. The adult male is
about five feet long, the body generally of a tawny grey, varying to
nearly white, marked with a conspicuous band of dark brown or black
spots running into each other, which, commencing on the upper part of
the back between the shoulders and curving downwards, is continued
along the sides, disappearing before it reaches the hind flippers.
The under parts are a dingy white, and the muzzle nearly black. The
female, according to Dr. Brown, rarely reaches five feet in length,
and is a dull white or yellowish straw-colour, tawny on the back, and
with similar markings to the male, but somewhat lighter. Some are
bluish or dark grey on the back, with “oval markings of a dark colour
apparently impressed on a yellowish or reddish-brown ground:” these,
Dr. Brown believes to be young females. The adult Greenland Seal is
readily recognized, but it varies so greatly in its different stages
of immaturity, and individuals differ so much from each other, that
the most trustworthy characters are to be found in the dentition and
the structure of the skull, which should in all cases be preserved, as
affording the most ready and reliable means of determining the species
of doubtful individuals. As has before been said, the second toe of the
fore flipper is the longest in this species.
HOODED SEAL.
The HOODED OR BLADDER-NOSED SEAL, _Cystophora cristata_ (Erxleben),
fig. 5, has occurred at least thrice upon our shores. In June, 1847, a
young one was killed in the Orwell, and is now in the Ipswich Museum;
in 1872 a second young one was killed in Scotland near St. Andrew’s;
and a third specimen, an adult male, was caught in February, 1873, at
Frodsham, on the Cheshire side of the Mersey, and lived in captivity
till the beginning of the following June (Pr. Liverpool Soc. xxvii.
p. 63). Others are believed to have been obtained in the Orkneys. Mr.
Howard Saunders was assured that the “Bladder-nose” is well-known as a
visitor to the Vae Skerries, Shetland (Alston’s ‘Mammalia of Scotland,’
p. 15); and a Seal supposed to be of this species was seen off the
Irish coast near Westport. In Hollingshed’s ‘Chronicles,’ in the year
1577, sundry fishes of monstrous shape, with cowls on their heads like
monks, and in the rest resembling the body of a man, are said to have
occurred in the Firth of Forth (Bell’s ‘Brit. Quads.’), the appearance
of which was of course followed by pestilence and famine. Throughout
the Polar seas this species is widely distributed, being found in the
Greenland seas, Iceland, and Spitzbergen, also occasionally in the
temperate waters of Europe and America. It is polygamous and migratory
in its habits: during the rutting season it is very pugnacious, and
Dr. Brown says great battles take place between the males, and their
roaring is said to be so loud that it can be heard for miles off. The
young, which are born in April, are pure white at first, which changes
to grey, and gradually becomes darker till it assumes the adult colour
and markings, which it appears to do about the fourth year; the colour
then is “dark chestnut or black, with a greater or less number of
round or oval markings of a still deeper hue.” The adult is furnished
with a curious bladder-like appendage, commencing at the nostrils,
with which it is connected, and continued upwards to the forehead:
this, when inflated, presents a very remarkable appearance; when the
animal is at rest it remains flaccid, but when irritated or excited,
it is blown up to its full extent. It is generally believed that the
“bladder” is found only in the male, but Dr. Brown does not think there
is any just ground for this belief; he does not, however, assign any
reason for doubting what has been positively asserted to be the case.
The Bladder-nose Seal is fierce in its nature and dangerous to attack;
although not actually taking the initiative it is always ready for
battle, and will avail itself of any advantage by turning upon and
following its opponent. The air-bladder, which is placed in the spot
usually most vulnerable, renders it difficult to kill, as it forms a
protection from the clubs of the sealers. This is one of the largest of
the Northern Seals, varying, according to different authorities, from 7
to 10 or even 12 feet in length. The first toe of the fore flipper is
the longest.
[Illustration: Fig. 5. HOODED SEAL (_Cystophora cristata_).]
THE GREY SEAL.
One other species of true Seal, the GREY SEAL, _Halichœrus gryphus_
(Fab.), claims a place in the British Fauna. Dr. Brown says the Grey
Seal “has no doubt been frequently confounded with other species,
particularly _Ph. barbata_ and _Ph. grœnlandica_.” Such has undoubtedly
been the case, and a specimen in the British Museum, long regarded as
_Ph. barbata_, has been referred to this species. There is, I believe,
no sufficient evidence that _Ph. barbata_ has ever occurred on the
British coast; but so imperfect even now is our acquaintance with the
Seals which frequent our shores, that it may even yet be found. As
before mentioned, the bristles forming the “whiskers” of _Ph. barbata_,
are simple flattened hairs, without the impressed pattern found in
the bristles of the known British species; they are nearly the same
thickness throughout, and sharply curved near the end.
The Grey Seal has been found on various parts of the coast, from
Shetland to the Isle of Wight; the Orkney and Shetland Isles, the
Hebrides, and the west coast of Ireland, however, appear to be its
chief places of resort on our shores; it has also been known to breed
on the Fern Islands. Haskier Island, off North Uist, has long been
known as a favourite breeding-place of this species. Captain Elwes,
who visited this island on the 30th June, 1868 (‘Ibis,’ 1869, p. 25),
informed Mr. Harvie-Brown that, up to the year 1858, an annual battle
was held there in the month of November, when the Seals resort to the
rocks with their young ones, and that from forty to one hundred, old
and young, would be killed. This wholesale destruction has been put a
stop to, and as it is extremely shy and difficult to approach at other
seasons, it is to be hoped that this species may for some time escape
extermination in this favourite resort.
[Illustration: Fig. 6. GREY SEAL (_Halichœrus gryphus_).]
According to Bell, this species inhabits the “temperate northern seas
rather than the Polar waters,” and is found in the North Sea, Baltic,
Iceland, Scandinavia, Denmark, and North Germany. Dr. Brown met with
a specimen a little south of Discoe Island, but can only speak of its
claims to a place in the Greenland Fauna as strongly probable. Bell
gives some interesting information with regard to the habits of this
species as observed in various British stations, and calls attention
to the remarkable fact, that whereas in this country it produces its
young in the months of October and November, on the Continent this is
always said to take place in February; he suggests, to account for
this singular discrepancy, that in our milder climate pairing takes
place much earlier than in Scandinavia. The young, which are born
white, are suckled for about a fortnight; the first coat is shed before
they take to the water, which is not for some weeks after birth. The
colour varies with age, sex, and season, so much, that it is not of
great service in their identification, their large size being the best
external guide. Lloyd, in his ‘Game-birds and Wild-fowl of Sweden and
Norway,’ speaking of this species, says that even should it somewhat
resemble the Common Seal in size and colour, as is at times the case,
it may always be readily distinguished from the latter by the greater
length of its claws and the superior breadth of its muzzle. The claws
project considerably beyond the ends of the toes, the first of which is
the longest. The general colour of the adult is greyish, tinged with
yellow, and spotted and blotched with darker grey; the under parts
lighter. The length of the adult varies from 7 to 10 feet. By the form
of its skull and teeth it is readily distinguished, as well as by the
great size of the animal. In the skull the brain-case is small, the
nasal opening very large, and the grinders conical, only the two hinder
pair in the upper, and the last pair in the lower jaw, double-rooted,
the rest simple. Professor Bell, in his history of ‘British
Quadrupeds,’ gives the generic and specific characters, as well as
excellent figures of the skulls of the various British Seals, which
will be found most useful in determining the species of any doubtful
individuals; other figures will be found in Dr. Gray’s ‘Catalogue of
the Seals and Whales in the British Museum.’
THE WALRUS, OR MORSE.
Of the many strange forms which the Zoological Society of London
has been the means of introducing to the stay-at-home naturalists
of this country, certainly not the least interesting is that of the
Walrus (_Trichechus rosmarus_, Linn.) It is true that in neither of
the instances in which the young animal has been brought alive to the
Gardens, has it long survived in its new home; but, short though its
residence amongst us, the opportunity has been afforded to many of
becoming acquainted with the Arctic stranger in _propriâ personâ_,
instead of through the distorted medium of the badly-stuffed skins,
or the equally bad representations of this interesting animal, which,
until recently, we have possessed. The first recorded appearance of
the Walrus in this country was, I believe, in 1624, when, according to
Hakluyt’s ‘Pilgrimes,’ a young one was brought to England by Master
Thomas Welden, in the _God-speed_, and duly presented at Court. In
1853 the Zoological Society became possessed of a young one, which
lived only a few days in their Gardens. On the 1st of November, 1867,
another was received, which lived till the 19th of December, when it
unfortunately died, notwithstanding the care bestowed upon it, both
as regards food and accommodation. This last was captured by the
whale-ship _Arctic_, on the 28th of August, 1867, in lat. 69° N. and
long. 64° W., and brought to Dundee, whence it was conveyed by Mr.
Bartlett to the Society’s Gardens. The captain of the _Arctic_ saw two
or three hundred walruses basking upon the ice, and sent out his boats
to the attack: among the killed was an old female followed by her young
one; the latter was taken on board and eventually brought to England.
[Illustration: Fig. 7. WALRUS, OR MORSE (_Trichechus rosmarus_).]
Although now confined to the icy seas of the Arctic circle, the Walrus
was probably not uncommon on our shores in times long past. The skull
is said to have been found in the peat near Ely, and Hector Boece,
in his ‘Cronikles of Scotland,’ mentions it as a regular inhabitant
of our shores in the end of the 15th century: in the present century
it has occurred several times, although it must be considered as a
very rare straggler, sadly out of its latitude. Wallace says that
its fossil remains have been found in Europe as far south as France,
and in America probably as far south as Virginia, and it was common
in the Gulf of St. Lawrence so late as 1770 (Leith Adams). In recent
times it has retreated before its great enemy, man, from the northern
coasts of Scandinavia to the circumpolar ice of Asia, America, and
Europe, sometimes, but rarely, reaching as far south as lat. 60°. In
Smith’s Sound the Walrus does not appear to move further north than
Cape Frazer, the meeting-place of the polar and southern tides: at this
point Captain Feilden saw a single example. Whenever met with, it is
the object of ruthless persecution, and is rapidly and surely becoming
exterminated wherever man can reach it; and but for its ice-loving
habits, which render its present strongholds always difficult, and
sometimes impossible, of access, it would doubtless long ere this have
become extinct.
Recently it has been met with on our shores, according to Bell, on the
coast of Harris in 1817; in the Orkneys in 1825; one was seen in 1827
in Hoy Sound, but not captured; and in 1841 one was killed near Harris.
Dr. Brown also states that two were seen, one in Orkney and the other
in Shetland, in 1857. Prof. Heddle also informed Mr. Harvie-Brown that
in 1849 or 1850 he saw an adult, and a young one, off the coast of the
parish of Walls, in Orkney (Harvie-Brown, _Proc. Nat. Hist. Soc. of
Glasgow_, 1879, p. 97.)[15]
The _Trichechus_ may be considered as intermediate between the true
Seals and the Eared Seals, to both of which families it has affinities:
it is carnivorous, feeding on mollusks, fish, and when it can get it,
the flesh of whales. The stomach of one, examined by Captain Feilden,
contained a large amount of green fluid oil, in which small particles
of _Ulva latissima_ could be detected, and minute fragments of the
shells of _Mya_. Its habits were so well and succinctly described by
Captain Cook a hundred years ago, that I cannot do better than quote
his own words, the accuracy of which has since been amply confirmed.
Whilst in Behring’s Straits, in lat. 70° 6′, and long. 196° 42′, on the
19th of August, 1778, Cook first met with the Walrus: “they lie,” he
says, “in herds of many hundreds upon the ice, huddling one over the
other like swine, and roar or bray very loud; so that in the night, or
in foggy weather, they gave us notice of the vicinity of the ice before
we could see it. We never found the whole herd asleep, some being
always on the watch. These, on the approach of the boat, would wake
those next to them, and the alarm being thus gradually communicated,
the whole herd would awake presently. But they were seldom in a hurry
to get away till after they had been once fired at, then they would
tumble one over the other into the sea in the utmost confusion; and if
we did not at the first discharge kill those we fired at, we generally
lost them, though mortally wounded. They do not appear to us to be that
dangerous animal some authors have described; not even when attacked.
They are rather more so to appearance than in reality. Vast numbers
of them would follow and come close up to the boats, but the flash of
a musquet in the pan, or even the bare pointing of one at them, would
send them down in an instant. The female will defend the young one to
the very last, and at the expense of her own life, whether in the water
or upon the ice. Nor will the young one quit the dam, though she be
dead; so that if you kill one you are sure of the other. The dam, when
in the water, holds the young one between her fore-fins.”[16] Since
Cook’s time the Walrus has learned to fear man, its only enemy except
the Polar Bear, and is more difficult to approach. When wounded, or its
young in danger, it has been known fiercely to attack the boats sent
for its capture, striving to overturn them, and piercing their sides
with its tusks: many serious accidents have been the result.
[Illustration: Fig. 8. _Vacca marina_ (reduced from Gesner).]
The number of Walruses killed annually by the Norwegian and Russian
hunters is very considerable; probably nearly an equal number are
wounded and lost. As the female produces only a single young one at
a birth, which is said to remain with the mother nearly two years,
“until its tusks are grown long enough to be used in grubbing up the
shell mud at the sea-bottom,” it will readily be imagined that the
destruction is greatly in excess of the production, and that they
are rapidly decreasing in numbers. A communication in the _Field_ of
March 27th, 1880 (p. 381), received from St. Francisco, points out
even more serious consequences resulting from the reckless destruction
of the Walrus than the mere extermination of a species, itself a
matter of no small regret. “If,” says the writer, “the whalers reach
Behring Strait before the ice breaks up, they remain on the coast, and
often hunt the Walrus for weeks together, with startling and serious
results. Last year’s campaign was considered successful, as about
11,000 Walruses were secured, most of them within the Arctic Sea. But
to attain this result, _between thirty and forty thousand animals were
killed_, so that only _one-third_ of the number destroyed were actually
utilised. There can be no doubt as to the ultimate consequence of such
glaring imprudence; but last year they were so painfully apparent as
to touch even the hearts of those who occasioned them. Not that the
whalers were moved to compassion by the victims themselves, but by
the sufferings of the human beings who were deprived of their chief
source of subsistence. The hardy tribes in the neighbourhood of Behring
Strait literally cannot exist without the Walrus, and so long as they
were its only human enemies the number destroyed was inconsiderable.
But the herds soon dwindled under the superior weapons and appliances
of civilised nations, and the survivors retreated, like the Whales,
towards the Pole. By the end of last season, not a single Walrus was
left on the coast, and the immediate result was such a terrible famine
among the natives that the whalers themselves speak of it remorsefully.
The population north of St. Lawrence Bay has been reduced by one-third;
and in a village which formerly contained 200 inhabitants, only one man
survived. Several of the whalers have consequently refused to take any
part in future Walrus hunts on the coast; they assert that for every
hundred animals killed, a native family must perish by starvation, and
they will not incur so heavy a responsibility.”
[Illustration: Fig. 9. HEAD OF WALRUS (Modified after Murie).]
About the month of August they repair to the shore, and congregating in
vast herds on the beach of some secluded bay, lie for weeks together
in a semi-torpid condition, without moving or feeding. Should their
retreat be discovered whilst in this state, great is the slaughter.
Mr. Lamont, in his ‘Seasons with the Sea Horses,’ says that in 1852,
on a small island off Spitzbergen (one of the Thousand Islands), two
small sloops discovered a herd of Walruses consisting of three or four
thousand, nine hundred of which they succeeded in killing, only a small
portion of the produce of which, however, they were able to carry away.
The colour of the Walrus is brown, paling with age, and the skin is
thickly covered with short hairs; the adult reaches the length of 10
or 15 feet, or, according to some authorities, even more, and weighs
from two to three thousand pounds. Its rounded head, heavy muzzle,
thickly set with stout bristles, small, round blood-shot eyes, and
formidable tusks, give to this animal a ferocious appearance which
is foreign to its nature, except when greatly excited or at pairing
time, when the old bulls are said to fight with great fierceness and
determination. A full-grown Walrus will yield from five to six hundred
pounds of blubber, the oil from which, however, is not so fine as that
of the Seal. The ivory tusks were formerly much used by dentists; at
present, I believe, owing to the introduction of vulcanite, very little
is applied to that purpose. Mr. Lamont mentions 24 in. in length and 4
lb. each in weight, as the size of a good pair of bull’s tusks: a pair
in the Norwich Museum measure 32 in. in length, and the heavier of the
two weighs 9 lb. 9 oz. The immensely elongated canine teeth which form
the “tusks,” are found in both sexes, but are shorter and more slender
in the female than in the male. The skin of the Walrus is valuable for
many purposes.
[Illustration: Fig. 10. “SEA HORSE” (_After Cook_).]
Few animals, so long known to man, have, when figured, been represented
so inaccurately as the Walrus: the hind feet are almost invariably
depicted extended backwards, like those of the Seal (so also in stuffed
specimens), whereas in the living animals they can be directed to the
front, and serve as supports to the body in progression on the land or
ice, in the same manner as the hind limbs of the eared seals. Dr. J.
E. Gray, in an article ‘On the Attitudes and Figures of the Morse,’
in the Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London for 1853, pp.
112-16, reproduces some of the wonderful prints of this animal from old
authors, most of which are purely imaginary: Fig. 8, p. 37, is copied
from one of these. By far the best portrait known, till quite recently,
is one published in Amsterdam in 1613, where an old female and her
young one are very accurately depicted: this has been reproduced in
Bell’s ‘British Quadrupeds,’ 2nd edition, p. 269. Fig. 10 is copied
from the “Sea Horse,” in the foreground of Cook’s illustration in ‘A
Voyage to the Pacific,’ &c., 1784 edit., vol. ii., p. 446; as will
be seen, this figure forms the source from which most subsequent
illustrations were derived. Fig. 7 is taken, by kind permission of the
late Mr. F. Buckland, from his ‘Log-book of a Fisherman and Zoologist,’
and represents “Jemmy,” the young Walrus, whose brief sojourn in the
Zoological Gardens has already been referred to. One of Mr. Wolf’s
“Zoological Sketches” represents a herd of Walruses in almost every
conceivable attitude, and of course beautifully drawn and coloured.
Some authors recognise two distinct species of Walrus, one of which
is said to be confined to the northern shores of the Atlantic,
the other to the Pacific Ocean. Mr. Allen, in the ‘North American
Pinnipeds,’ enters at length into the subject, and minutely describes
the peculiarities which characterise each species. Reviving, after the
example of Malmgren, the almost obsolete generic name of _Odobænus_, he
describes the Atlantic Walrus under the name _O. rosmarus_; the animal
found in the Pacific he calls _O. obesus_. The chief external points
of difference in the latter appear to be in the facial outline, the
longer and thinner tusks, “generally more convergent, with much greater
inward curvature; the mystacial bristles shorter and smaller, and the
muzzle relatively deeper and broader, in corelation with the greater
breadth and depth of the skull anteriorly.” The eyes are also said to
lack the “fiery red” appearance attributed to the Atlantic Walrus,
and to be smaller and very protuberant. Cook’s figure reproduced at
p. 41, also that at p. 177 of Scammon’s book, are those of _Odobænus
obesus_, and the fine pair of tusks mentioned at p. 40, as now in the
Norwich Museum, were probably also obtained from a Pacific Walrus. The
figure at p. 33, and the excellent figure by Wolf, at p. 457 of Lloyd’s
‘Game-birds and Wild-fowl of Sweden and Norway,’ are of the Atlantic
Walrus.
It is much to be regretted that the extinction of this harmless and
useful animal is merely a matter of time, and that perhaps before
many years have passed it may have ceased to exist; the only hope
appears to be that when it has become too scarce to render its
pursuit remunerative, a remnant may still be left to continue the
species around the far off and unapproachable islands of the Arctic
seas. Even in Franz Josef Land, where, in the summer of 1880, Mr.
Leigh-Smith found the Walrus very abundant: it will probably not
long remain unmolested, for that gentleman informed Captain Feilden
that the Norwegian walrus-hunters, when they heard of his discovery,
talked of pushing on for Franz Josef Land next summer, the Spitsbergen
walrus-hunting having become very uncertain, from the paucity and
wariness of the animals.[17]
CETACEA.
The occasional stranding upon our shores of some monster member of the
order CETACEA serves from time to time to reawaken our interest in
these wonderful animals, and sets us thinking how little we know about
them, and how small is our acquaintance with their life-history.
Nor is this lack of information surprising when we consider that
the difficulties in the way of studying the larger Cetacea, are so
great as to be almost insuperable to any ordinary person, and even
to the leaders of zoological science rarely does the opportunity
present itself of examining specimens in the flesh; for, of the rare
instances in which they are cast ashore, the majority occur in wild
and unfrequented parts of the coast, where they are probably cut up
for their oil before a naturalist has an opportunity of examining
them. From their unnatural position when cast up, and their altered
appearance, owing to the falling in of some parts and the distension of
others, correct portraiture is almost impossible; and their great size
renders it difficult and expensive to make them serviceable to science,
while from the putrid condition in which they are frequently found, a
close examination is too often anything but agreeable. If seen in their
native element, where alone they _should_ be seen duly to appreciate
their grand proportions and perfect adaptation to their mode of life,
the view must be brief and too often distant, certainly affording rare
opportunities for close observation. There is thus little left for
naturalists to study, except the bony skeletons, and of these often
mere fragments. Under these circumstances, we shall cease to wonder at
the great confusion which, till recently, existed in the classification
and nomenclature of the _Cetacea_, and which has been only partially
cleared away, chiefly by the labours of Professors Flower and Turner
in this country, and by Professors Eschricht, Reinhardt, Van Beneden,
Gervais, and others on the continent. The literature of the subject is
widely scattered and difficult of access; and, although Dr. Gray and
Professor Flower have done much to condense and systematize what is
known, our acquaintance with the tropical and southern species of this
interesting order is not at present sufficient to furnish materials
for a monograph worthy of the subject. No class of animals has been
called so many names, or so vilely caricatured in portraits, as the
unfortunate Whales.
It is scarcely necessary now to say that the _Cetacea_ hold a fully
recognized place in the great class _Mammalia_, although this honour
has not always been accorded to them. Ray classed them with the Fishes;
and although Linnæus finally placed them in their true position,
Pennant, following his earlier mistake, failed to do so. The members
of this order, which includes the Whales proper, Narwhal, Dolphins,
and Porpoises (with which, until recently, the Dugong and Manatees
were improperly associated under the name of Herbivorous Cetaceans),
bring forth their young alive. These are nourished by the female,
which, for this purpose, is furnished with two inguinal mammæ. They are
warm-blooded, and breathe by means of lungs, rendering frequent visits
to the surface of the water necessary, as the animal can only respire
when the orifice of the nostrils, called the blow-hole, which is placed
on the top of the head, is above water. The breathing apparatus is very
peculiar, being so modified that the air is admitted into the trachea
without passing through the mouth; the Whale can thus breathe freely,
provided the blow-hole be above water, even when its mouth is submerged
or filled with water. There are no external ears, but a small aperture
situated just behind the eye, communicates with a perfectly-constructed
internal hearing apparatus, and this, as the water is an excellent
conductor of sound, is all-sufficient. The food of the _Cetacea_
consists of various forms of marine animals, from the Seal, which
frequently forms a meal to the fierce Grampus, to the minute creatures
which go to build up the giant form of the Right-Whale. Some possess
numerous formidable teeth in both jaws; others have teeth in the
lower jaw only; and in one section the teeth are only present in the
embryo, but in their stead, from the upper jaw depend curious plates,
arranged side by side, to which the name of _baleen_ has been given.
The animal is encased in a layer of fat called “blubber,” which lies
beneath the skin, and serves to retain the heat of the body, and the
skin is smooth, polished, and quite devoid of hair or scales. On the
back of most species is found a fleshy dorsal fin, and the fore limbs
are represented by flippers externally undivided; the hind limbs, so
far as external appearance is concerned, are altogether absent, but a
rudimentary pelvis is found embedded in the flesh. The tail-fin forms
the chief organ of locomotion: it is always fixed horizontally, and is
of great size and power, enabling the animal, by its vigorous use, to
attain great speed. There are many and striking peculiarities in the
bony skeleton which it is not necessary here to enumerate.
[Illustration: Fig. 11. MEDIAN SECTION, SHOWING OUTSIDE LEFT HALF OF
SKULL OF WHALEBONE WHALE, WITH BALEEN IN POSITION (_modified after
Eschricht_).
=Br.=, brain cavity; =J=, =J*=, upper and lower jaw-bones; =bo=,
=bo=, being roughened parts of the bone sawn through; arrows indicate
the narial passages, which open at =s=, spout-hole; =w=, whalebone;
=t=, tongue, in dotted outline; =n=, nerve aperture, lower jaw.
]
Before proceeding to give some account of the species which have been
found in the British Seas, it will first be necessary to say a few
words as to the arrangement of the genera and species. I shall enter
into this part of the subject, however, so far only as is necessary for
us clearly to understand the relative positions of the species which we
shall have to consider.
Professor Flower divides the order _Cetacea_ into two sub-orders:
First, _Mystacoceti_, or _Balænoidea_, in all the members of
which baleen takes the place of teeth, which are never developed,
disappearing before birth; second, _Odontoceti_ or _Delphinoidea_,
in which teeth (sometimes very numerous) are always developed after
birth. The first sub-order is a very restricted one, embracing only
two families, _Balænidæ_ and _Balænopteridæ_, to the former of which
belong the two genera of Right-Whales, _Balæna_ and _Eubalæna_; and
to the latter, two genera, namely, _Megaptera_ and _Balænoptera_. To
these two genera[18] belong the Rorquals, which occasionally occur
in the British seas. The second sub-order, _Odontoceti_, contains
the families of _Physeteridæ_, represented by the Sperm Whale,
Beaked Whale, and several allied species; _Platanistidæ_, consisting
of some curious forms found only in India and South America; and
_Delphinidæ_, comprising the Narwhal, Beluga, or White Whale, Grampus,
Porpoise, and Dolphins. The total number of British _Cetacea_ has been
variously estimated; Dr. Gray, in 1864, described thirty, and in 1873
thirty-three species; while Bell, whom we shall follow, recognised only
twenty-two species in his second edition, published in 1874.
The following table of the British Cetacea will serve to indicate at a
glance the precise position assigned to each species, in the two main
divisions into which the order is divided:--
BRITISH CETACEA.
+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| SUB-ORDER. FAMILY. SUB-FAMILY. GENERA. |
| |
| {Balænidæ Balæninæ Balæna |
| =1.= { |
|MYSTACOCETI { {Megapterinæ Megaptera |
| (=Whalebone-Whales.=) {Balænopteridæ { |
| {Balænopterinæ Balænoptera |
| |
| |
| |
| {Physeterinæ Physeter |
| {Physeteridæ { {Hyperoodon |
| { { { |
| { {Ziphiinæ {Ziphius |
| =2.= { {Mesoplodon |
|ODONTOCETI { { Beluginæ {Monodon |
| (=Toothed Whales.=) { { {Delphinapterus |
| {Delphinidæ { {Orca |
| { {Grampus |
| { Delphininæ {Globicephalus |
| {Phocœna |
| { |
| { Delphinus |
| |
| |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
| SUB-ORDER. SPECIES. |
| |
| {(?) B. mysticetus, _Right-Whale_ |
| =1.= {B. biscayensis, _Atlantic Right-Whale_ |
|MYSTACOCETI M. longimana, _Hump-backed Whale_ |
| (=Whalebone-Whales.=) {B. musculus, _Common Rorqual_ |
| {B. sibbaldii, _Sibbald’s_ ” |
| {B. laticeps, _Rudolphi’s_ ” |
| {B. rostrata, _Lesser_ ” |
| |
| P. macrocephalus, _Sperm Whale_ |
| {H. rostratum, _Beaked Whale_ |
| {H. latifrons, _Broad-fronted Beaked Whale_|
| Z. cavirostris, _Cuvier’s Whale_ |
| =2.= M. bidens, _Sowerby’s Whale_ |
|ODONTOCETI M. monoceros, _Narwhal_ |
| (=Toothed Whales.=) D. leucas, _White Whale, or Beluga_ |
| O. gladiator, _Grampus, or Killer_ |
| G. griseus, _Risso’s Grampus_ |
| G. melas, _Pilot Whale_ |
| P. communis, _Porpoise_ |
| {D. delphis, _Common Dolphin_ |
| {D. tursio, _Bottle-nosed Dolphin_ |
| {D. acutus, _White-sided Dolphin_ |
| {D. albirostris, _White-beaked Dolphin_ |
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
MYSTACOCETI (WHALEBONE WHALES.)
_BALÆNIDÆ._
THE GREENLAND RIGHT-WHALE.
The first species, both in order and importance, of the Family
_Balænidæ_ is the well-known _Balæna mysticetus_, the GREENLAND, or
RIGHT-WHALE as it is called by the whalers. So extremely doubtful,
however, are the claims of this animal to a place in the British Fauna,
that it is retained in the present treatise solely on account of the
great interest attaching to it as a species, and not from any idea
of maintaining for it a position, which, although hitherto assigned
to it, has now become untenable. The use of the term well-known is
perhaps unadvised; for, although this species has engaged the energies
and industry of the merchant seamen of Northern Europe for centuries,
so little was known of it scientifically, that not a single skeleton
had ever found its way into any European museum, until Eschricht
obtained one from Holsteinborg, in Greenland, in 1846. The recorded
instances of the supposed occurrence of this species in the British
Seas are unsatisfactory in the extreme. The most positive record is
that in Messrs. Paget’s ‘Natural History of Great Yarmouth.’ They say:
“_Balæna mysticetus_--common Whale--a small one taken near Yarmouth,
July 8, 1784.” Sir James Paget, however, in a letter to the Author,
is unable to add to the brief statement, as will be seen from the
following extract from his communication:--“I am sorry I can give you
no information respecting the Whale taken off Yarmouth in 1784; I
have no notes as to the source from which I derived the statement, but
probably it was from some MS. of Mr. Dawson Turner’s. It is not likely
that any bones of the Whale were kept in Yarmouth, for there was no
naturalist there at the time, and the whaling-trade, which was then
actively carried on from the port, must have made Whales’ bones very
common.” This is all that is ever likely to be learned of the Yarmouth
Right-whale; but the season at which it occurred would render the
heated seas on our coast utterly unbearable to an ice-loving inhabitant
of the Arctic seas. This, with its small size, would seem to point
to a closely-allied species to be mentioned soon. Sibbald records
the occurrence of what he considers was probably a Right-whale, at
Peterhead, in 1682; and a Whale recorded at Tynemouth by Willughby may
have been of this species. In the first edition of Bell’s ‘Quadrupeds’
is a communication from the Rev. Mr. Barclay to the effect that on the
coast of Zetland dead or very lean Whales of this species have several
times been found or have run aground; but in the second edition of the
same work the authors state that “there is no proof these references do
not apply to some other species.” The same may be said with reference
to Low’s remarks in the ‘Fauna Orcadensis,’ p. 158. This is all we know
of the supposed occurrence of Right-Whales in British waters in recent
times, and there is little doubt that these, if Right-Whales at all,
should be referred to the next species.
The extreme northern habitat assigned to this species by those who
have devoted much time and labour to the investigation of the subject,
clearly proves that it must either have changed its habitat, which its
present habits seem to render improbable, or that some other species
formerly inhabited the temperate seas outside the Arctic circle
extending southward to the Atlantic as far as latitude 40°, for it is
beyond doubt that a brisk whale-fishery was carried on in former times
by the Basque population in the Bay of Biscay and adjacent seas as far
back as the 8th or 10th century. That such a southern species, distinct
from the northern Right-whale did exist, is proved by Professors
Eschricht and Reinhardt in their splendid memoir of the ‘Greenland
Whale,’ a translation of which, edited by Professor Flower, was
published by the ‘Ray Society’ in 1866, and of that species we shall
give some account further on.
[Illustration: Fig. 12. GREENLAND RIGHT-WHALE (_Balæna mysticetus_,
Linn.)]
It has been asserted that the Greenland Whales supposed formerly to
have visited our coasts, have been driven north by the increased
traffic in the more frequented seas of temperate Europe; but from the
habits of this species as observed on the west coast of Greenland, at
the fishing stations established by the Danish Government, and recorded
in the memoir just referred to, no confirmation of this theory is
afforded. The fishery at these stations was prosecuted from the shore
when the Whales appeared upon the coast in the winter months; as the
spring advanced they followed the receding ice-line, and were seen in
summer as far north in Baffin’s Bay as ships had at that time succeeded
in penetrating, whilst their southward range in winter was always
limited by a rather northerly degree of latitude. This, it is shown,
went on with the greatest regularity for at least 80 years, during
which the Whales constantly made their appearance at the same places,
at the same season, without the slightest alteration taking place. The
fact of the Whales always moving northward as the ice breaks up, will
account for their being found in the spring in different latitudes;
thus, on the Greenland coast, they are found, at this season, in
latitude 65° 25′; but in Davis’ Strait, in 61° to 62°, always, however,
inseparable from the ice. Messrs. Eschricht and Reinhardt thus
conclude: “It seems, therefore, that the Whales have not retreated
further north, as they are still found within precisely the same limits
in which they were found at the beginning of the persecution, but in
numbers so diminished that the fishery will hardly repay the trouble
and expense attending it.”
Capt. Feilden, the naturalist to Sir Geo. Nares’s Arctic expedition,
speaking of the Northern range of this species, says he is quite
satisfied that “no Whale could inhabit at the present day the frozen
sea to the north of Robeson Channel. To penetrate from the North-water
of Baffin Bay to Robeson Channel, would be a hazardous task for
this great animal, and in this opinion the experienced whaling
quartermasters, who accompanied our Expedition, coincided. We may
dismiss from our minds the idea or hope that nearer to the Pole, and
beyond the limits of present discovery, there may be haunts in the
Polar Sea suitable for the Right-whale. I do not look for the speedy
extinction of the Greenland Whale; but it is probable that in a few
years the fishing will no longer prove profitable to the fine fleet
of whalers that now sail from our northern ports, and I see no hope
of Arctic discovery increasing our knowledge of the range of this
animal.”[19]
The southern limit of the Right-whale in the Northern ocean may be
shown by a line drawn from the coast of Lapland at 70°, just touching
the southern point of Iceland, and ending on the coast of Labrador at
about 55° north latitude.
The whaling-trade, which once employed so many hardy seamen, is now
reduced to very narrow limits, and appears to have passed almost
entirely into the hands of the English, or rather Scotch. The Biscayans
were not content with exterminating the Whales found in their own seas,
but in 1721 they had twenty vessels in the Greenland fishery; the Dutch
also took a large part in the trade; and in the year 1680, when they
appear to have been the most actively engaged in the fishery, they are
said to have had about 260 ships and 14,000 men employed. In 1725 the
South Sea Company embarked in the trade, but meeting with considerable
losses, speedily gave it up. The Government, in order to encourage this
languishing branch of industry, in 1732 granted a bounty of 20s. per
ton on the oil; this, being found insufficient, was increased in 1749
to 40s. per ton, which caused a considerable increase in the number
of vessels; but upon Parliament, in 1777, reducing the bounty to 30s.
per ton, the number of vessels rapidly fell off from 105 to 39; the
bounty was then, in 1781, raised to its old level, with a corresponding
increase in the number of vessels employed. Then followed a gradual
process of reduction, until in the year 1824 the bounty altogether
ceased, and the ships fell off from 112 in 1824, to 88 in 1827.[20]
During the nine years ending 1818 there was an average of 91 English
(sailing from eight ports), and forty-one Scotch ships (sailing from
nine ports) employed in the trade; in 1830 they were reduced to 41
English vessels (sailing from five ports), to which Hull contributed
33, and 50 Scotch vessels (sailing from seven ports), to which
Peterhead contributed 13, and Dundee 9.
The years 1819 and 1830 were both very disastrous to the whale-trade;
in the former year fourteen British vessels were lost, and in the
latter, nineteen British ships were totally wrecked, and twelve
seriously injured. The number of ships employed has since gradually
decreased, and at present Dundee and Peterhead are the only two ports
in Great Britain engaged in the whale-fishery. Dundee sends out fifteen
powerful steam-vessels, which leave about the beginning of May, and
if fortunate in filling up, return, according to circumstances, from
August to the beginning of November. Peterhead sends five steamers and
one sailing vessel; they are ship-rigged, and from two to five hundred
tons register, and 40 to 100 horse power. The expense now incurred
renders it necessary that a large number of Whales should be taken to
make the voyage pay: the _Arctic_, in her voyage of 1873, captured
twenty-eight Whales, which were estimated to produce in oil and bone
£18,925, or about £678 per Whale, the best Whale, a female with sucker,
was estimated at £1,500, and the smallest at only £110. An average
Whale produces 9½ tons of oil, a ton measuring 252 gallons, and 7 ft.
6 in. of whalebone; the longest bone cut of the twenty-eight fish was
11 ft. 9 in. and the shortest 2 ft. 6 in. This was considered a very
successful year. The whale-fishery was commenced at Peterhead in 1788;
since that time, up to the year 1879, Captain David Gray informs me
that 995 voyages have been made to the Greenland and Davis’ Straits
whale and seal-fisheries, and there have been brought home 4195 Whales,
furnishing 30,975 tons of oil, and 1549 tons of whalebone, besides
1,673,052 Seals, yielding 20,913 tons of oil, leaving a nett profit
of £583,020, or £586 per ship per voyage. The Dundee whale-fishery
commenced in 1790, and the seal-fishery in 1860; since that time up to
the season of 1879, 538 voyages have been made to the Greenland and
Davis’ Straits whale and seal-fisheries, including Labrador, which have
produced 4220 Whales, yielding 32,774 tons of oil and 1640 tons of
whalebone, besides 917,278 Seals, yielding 10,464 tons of oil, valued
together at £2,160,400, leaving a nett profit of £652,320, or £1212
10s. per ship per voyage. Capt. Gray adds: “I have often been asked
where all the Whales are gone to; let the above figures be the reply.”
The present price of whale-oil is from £28 to £30 per ton, the
whalebone ranging as high as £1100 per ton, according to the length of
the bone; but although there are exceptions, of late years the fishery,
as a whole, is said, on good authority, not to have paid the heavy
expenses of the fleet engaged in it, nor does there seem much prospect
of improvement, mineral oil being now used for many purposes for which
formerly whale and seal oil was required. One of the chief uses to
which whale and seal oil are now applied is in the preparation of the
jute fibre, the manufacture of which is so extensively carried on at
the port of Dundee, also the chief centre of the whaling-trade.
An interesting account of a whaling voyage in the ship _Arctic_,
and full particulars of the mode pursued in taking, and subsequent
treatment of the fish, is given by Captain A. H. Markham, in his
‘Whaling Cruise to Baffin’s Bay.’[21]
The usual length of a full-grown Right-whale is about 50 feet; but Dr.
Brown, in his paper on the Cetaceans of the Greenland Seas (_P. Z. S._,
1868, p. 539), gives the dimensions of one which measured 65 feet. The
general colour is black. The mouth occupies about one-third of the
entire length, and the baleen is from 10 to 12 feet long; it has been
known to reach the great length of 13 ft. 2 in., and 9 in. in width.
This baleen, which is found depending from the upper jaw, consists
of a number of horny plates, similar in structure to the horn of the
rhinoceros, consisting of a fibrous mass glutinated together in the
solid portion, and placed transversely along either side of the palate;
they are arranged closely together, with the external edge smooth,
and gradually thinning off towards the inner margin, which ends in a
fringe of long hair-like fibres: the number of laminæ is about 300 on
each side.[22] Captain David Gray, of the _Eclipse_, an experienced
whaler, in a communication to ‘Land and Water,’ on December 1, 1877,
pointed out and first satisfactorily explained the means by which these
extraordinary appendages are disposed of when the mouth of the Whale
is closed. He shows that when the mouth is shut, the slender ends of
the whalebone curve backwards towards the throat, the longer ones from
the middle of the jaw falling into the hollow formed by the shortness
of those behind them; when the animal opens its mouth to feed, the
whalebone springs forward and downwards, thus always by its elasticity,
filling up the space between the upper and lower jaws, whether the
mouth be fully or only partially open, and interposing a strainer
between the cavity of the mouth and the external water, effectually
preventing the food which enters the mouth from passing out with the
flow of water which passes through the mouth as the great beast pursues
and captures its minute food.
The Whale whilst feeding swims along with its mouth open, until it
has collected a quantity of the small marine animals which form its
food; then, closing its capacious under jaw, it forces out the water
between the plates of baleen, leaving the captive prey stranded on
its huge tongue, when it swallows them at leisure. The food of the
Greenland Whale consists entirely of small marine animals, particularly
a kind of shrimp, found in great abundance in the Arctic seas. This
species seldom remains under water longer than from ten to fifteen
minutes, returning to the surface to breathe, which, if undisturbed,
occupies from two to three minutes. Capt. Gray, however, has known
it when harpooned to stay under water fifty minutes. Professor Owen
describes the wonderful provision for storing of blood in a vast plexus
of blood-vessels found in the Cetacea, at the back of the lungs and
between them and the ribs, thus enabling them, although lung-breathing
animals, to stay under water for so protracted a period, and states
that the peculiar non-valvular structure of the veins of the Cetacea,
and the pressure on these reservoirs of blood at the depths to which
they retreat when harpooned, explain the profuse and lethal hæmorrhage
which follows a wound, that in other mammalia would not be fatal.[23]
[Illustration: Fig. 13. ATLANTIC RIGHT-WHALE (_Balæna biscayensis_,
Eschricht), after Capellini.]
The Right-Whale is believed by Eschricht and Reinhardt to bring forth
its single young one (rarely two) about the end of March or beginning
of May, and the time of gestation to be thirteen or fourteen months,
so that it will bring forth only every other year; Scoresby considers
that they go eight or nine months, and bring forth in February or
March.[24] The young one is supposed to be suckled for twelve months,
during which time the baleen is gradually developed. In disposition,
the Greenland Whale is timid and retiring; the chief danger in its
capture arises from its rapid descent when harpooned; the line is then
carried out with such speed that, should it foul or all run out and
not be immediately cut, the boat will be upset or carried under water.
Capt. David Gray estimates the speed of a struck or scared Whale at
about eight miles an hour, and the ordinary speed at about four miles,
whether sounding or along the surface. It has never been known to
attack a boat, but accidents sometimes happen if approached too closely
in its death “flurry,” which is said to be very terrible to witness.
Its fondness for its young is such that if the “sucker” be killed the
old one readily falls a victim, and the whalers do not fail to avail
themselves, for their own advantage, of this amiable trait in its
character.
THE ATLANTIC RIGHT-WHALE.
Until recently it was believed that a Whale formerly common in
the temperate waters of the North Atlantic was identical with the
Right-Whale of the Arctic seas, of which we have just given an account,
but Professors Eschricht and Reinhardt have successfully shown, as
stated in the previous article, that such is not the case, the habits
of the two animals, as well as the localities frequented by each, being
totally distinct. They have, therefore, described the more southern
form as a distinct species, under the name of _Balæna biscayensis_, or
the ATLANTIC RIGHT-WHALE, the “Sarde” of the French, “Nordkaper” of the
Dutch, and “Sletbag” of the Iceland whalers of former days.
As early as the twelfth century, long before the whale-fishery was
prosecuted in the Arctic seas, a brisk trade was carried on by the
Basque fishermen from the Biscayan ports. That this fishery must have
been of considerable importance, in a mercantile point of view, there
can be no doubt, from the numerous references to be met with in early
records; for instance, in 1261, a tithe was laid upon the tongues of
all Whales imported into Bayonne, where they formed a much-esteemed
article of food, and in 1338 a duty of £6 a Whale on those brought
into the port of Biarritz was relinquished by Edward III. to Peter de
Puyanne for services rendered; these and other like records extant show
that for a long period this branch of industry was briskly prosecuted.
Gradually, however, the Whales became more and more scarce, and the
hardy Basque seamen, after following their prey to Newfoundland and
Iceland, shortly after the discovery of Spitsbergen in 1596 found their
all-but-lost occupation suddenly revive; the “Sletbag” was left behind,
but the home of the true Greenland Whale, a much more valuable animal,
was for the first time invaded, and that species, which then abounded
in the seas surrounding Spitzbergen, speedily became the object of the
whalers’ attack; many vessels were fitted out for its pursuit which
carried Biscayan harpooners, the crews, also, generally consisting, in
part, of these hardy seamen.
So recently as the close of the last century, the Atlantic Right-whale
was not infrequent in the North Atlantic; it was regularly caught on
the coast of Nantucket, and occasionally by the American Whalers on the
coast of Iceland; it has, however, now become very rare. Professors
Eschricht and Reinhardt thus summarise the distinctive characters of
the “Sletbag,” “Sarde,” or “Nordkaper,” so far as they have been able
to glean from all the sources accessible to them, and consider the
species identical with their _B. biscayensis_:--
1. “That it was much more active than the Greenland Whale, much
quicker, and more violent in its movements, and, accordingly, both
more difficult and more dangerous to catch.”
2. “That it was smaller (it being, however, impossible to give an
exact statement of its length), and had much less blubber.”
3. “That its head was shorter, and that its whalebone was,
comparatively speaking, much thicker, but scarcely more than half
as long as that of the Greenland Whale, being, however, still much
longer than that of even the very largest Fin-Whale, although the
‘Sletbag’ itself probably scarcely attained to half the length of the
last-named.”
4. “That it was regularly infested with a Cirriped belonging to the
genus _Coronula_, and that it belonged to the temperate Northern
Atlantic as exclusively as the Greenland Whale belonged to the icy
Polar Sea, so that it must be considered as equally exceptional when
either of these species strayed into the range of the other, and,
moreover, that in its native sea it was to be found farthest towards
south in the winter (namely, in the Bay of Biscay, and near the coast
of North America, down to Cape Cod), while in the summer it roved
about in the sea round Iceland and between this Island and the most
northerly part of Norway.”[25]
In addition to the British Right-Whales mentioned at the commencement
of the previous article, which may almost with certainty be referred
to this species, I am enabled, through the kindness of my friend,
Captain David Gray, of Peterhead, to record two other instances of the
occurrence of the Atlantic Right-Whale in British waters. With regard
to the first case, Captain Gray was good enough to obtain for me the
independent testimony of two old men, James Webster and John Allan,
both of whom are still living at Peterhead, and were witnesses of the
events which they relate. The two statements coincide so remarkably,
making allowance for the lapse of so many years, that it is only
necessary to give one. James Webster, 85 years of age, remembers
Greenland Whales coming into South Bay of Peterhead: at that time he
would have been about 10 years of age [Jno. Allan says “it was in 1806
or 1807, same year as the new parish church was opened;” this was in
1806, and agrees with Webster’s statement that he was 10 years old at
the time]. Remembers them being an old Whale and a sucker. Saw five
boats go out after them; as far as he recollects, thinks it was the
month of October [“in the summer-time,” Allan]. They struck the old
Whale, and put three harpoons into her, then they struck the sucker
and killed it; brought the sucker ashore and flenched it at the South
Quay. [Allan says “they killed the young Whale, and flenched her at the
South Quay: she, having sunk, it was two or three days after, before
they got her in.”] After they had three harpoons in the old Whale, she
went twice up into the head of the Bay, going so far that she turned
the sand up, and then she stove two of the boats, and broke Mackie’s,
one of the harpooners, legs. [Allan does not remember the name of the
injured man, and thinks only one boat was stove.] After this, the Whale
took a run, and went out of the Bay, blowing blood. They followed her
as fast as they could, they cut two of the boats from her, and left her
towing one boat with their Jack blowing, after taking the crew out of
her, and in this condition the Whale went out of sight, and they never
saw or heard of her again. Allan says that when she went round the
South Head, a heavy sea being on at the time, and darkness coming on,
the boats cut and let her go, leaving the boat which was stove, fast
to the Whale, the flag still blowing, and that she went out to sea and
was never seen again. Capt. Gray adds that “Capt. Wm. Volum, of the
‘Enterprise,’ and Capt. Alex. Geary, of the ‘Hope,’ both took part in
the chase, and in that year the ‘Hope’ returned from Greenland on 30th
June, and the ‘Enterprise’ on 30th July; consequently, it must have
been some time after the latter date that the Whales came into the
Bay; probably Webster is right when he names October.”
The second instance referred to by Captain Gray came under his own
observation. Whilst taking a walk round the “Heads,” one Sunday morning
before church, to the best of his recollection early in October, 1872,
“I saw,” says Captain Gray, “a Greenland Whale within half a mile of
the rocks off the South Head; its appearance and movements were exactly
the same as those I have seen in Spitsbergen waters.” Accustomed, as
Captain Gray has been for many years, to watch the appearance and
actions of the northern species of Right-Whale, in the Polar seas, it
seems impossible for a man of his great experience to have mistaken any
other species of Whale for one of the _Balæninæ_.
Of course, there still remains the question as to whether these Whales
were the Greenland or Atlantic species, but I think the consideration
of the circumstances under which they occurred, leaves no doubt what
the reply must be. Captain Gray writes--“Until you began to question
the identity of these Whales harpooned here in 1806, no one had ever
had the smallest doubt of their being Greenland Whales,” and that had
there been any marked difference in their appearance, it would have
been at once noticed by such experienced men as those who captured
the Whale at Peterhead; but he adds that “so far as the habits of
the Greenland Whale are known, it is contrary to our experience that
they should visit our shores at the season of the year at which these
Whales were seen here, when we know that the Arctic Whale regularly
disappears into the depths of the Polar ice towards the end of summer,
where no ships or steamers can follow them.” It would naturally be
expected that, towards the end of summer the Atlantic Whale would also
be approaching the northern limit of its range, and this is precisely
the season when all the Whales of this description, of which the date
is given, appear to have occurred, except two in a much more southerly
locality, (their proper winter habitat) shortly to be mentioned. That
the Peterhead men did not speak of any marked difference in the Whale
which visited their Bay and those they had just returned from pursuing
in the Polar ice may perhaps be accounted for partly by the similarity
of the two species, and partly by their not having killed the adult
individual; whilst the restless activity of the latter may possibly be
due, not only to the presence of its young one, but, in part, to the
superior activity of the Atlantic species, which is said to render it
so much more dangerous and difficult to catch.
But it may be said that if there be such a species, having a range,
which in summer extends from the entrance of Davis’ Strait to Iceland
and the North Cape, why are they not occasionally met with by the
whalers in crossing the Atlantic to and from their more northern
fishing grounds? Although such an encounter with a creature confessedly
of rare occurrence would be in the highest degree improbable, still
here again, through the kindness of Capt. Gray I am able to say that
such encounters have taken place, and could we know the experience of
all the whalers who have crossed the Atlantic, perhaps other instances
might be put on record. Captain David Gray’s father told him that while
mate to his father (Capt. David Gray’s grandfather), when crossing the
Atlantic on the homeward voyage from Davis’ Strait, the vessel ran into
a Greenland Whale (as he supposed it) and that he was anxious to lower
some boats and go after it, but that his father would not allow him to
do so, there being too much sea running at that time. This again would
be in the summer season. It seems probable that not being aware of the
existence of a Southern species of Right-Whale, or in consequence of
the high sea which was running at the time, the Grays did not observe,
or, at least, failed to mention, the peculiarities which distinguish
the Atlantic species. But I am indebted to Capt. Gray for other
instances of the occurrence of this species not far from Cape Farewell,
and in at least one case the species was identified, the observer being
aware of the existence of the Atlantic Whale, and the circumstances
apparently favourable for close observation. On the 1st May, 1868,
Capt. Alexander Murray, now commanding the S.S. “Windward,” at that
time trading to South Greenland, in the “Sir Colin Campbell,” saw near
Cape Farewell, several Right-Whales, close enough to distinguish their
different features and general appearance. Capt. Murray remarks that,
“they are a shorter Whale than the Greenland and much flatter in the
crown;” he also noticed “Barnacles and grass near the blow-holes,” and
states that from conversations he has had with American shipmasters
employed in hunting these Whales, that these parasites are always
present in this species, whereas the Greenland Whales are as invariably
free from them. Capt. Murray adds that in 1867 three American whalers
came into Cumberland Gulf, one having six, one three, and the other
two Atlantic Whales on board, all of which were taken in the summer,
a little to the eastward of Cape Farewell; and, finally, Capt. Gray’s
brother, who commands the Hudson Bay Company’s Steamer, “Labrador,”
told him that in June, 1879, he saw two of these Whales in lat. 57 N.
and long. 33 W.; they were close alongside, and the weather at the time
calm: they went away in a south-westerly direction. It would seem,
indeed, that this species is not at all an infrequent summer visitor to
the open sea, lying to the east of Cape Farewell.
Two recent instances of the occurrence of this species on the eastern
side of the Atlantic are on record, both of which were met with in
winter, and in the warmer latitudes of the Bay of Biscay and the
Mediterranean Sea. On the 17th of January, 1854, a young one with its
mother appeared in the harbour of St. Sebastian; the mother escaped,
but the little one was caught, and a drawing of it made by Dr. Monedero
(reproduced in Bell’s ‘Brit. Quad.,’ 2nd Edit. p. 387); the skeleton
was preserved for the museum of Pampeluna, thence it was removed
by Prof. Eschricht in 1858 to the Copenhagen Museum, for which he
purchased it. Also, on the 9th February, 1877, a Whale was captured
in the Gulf of Taranto, which has been referred to this species, and
these, I believe, are the only specimens which have been taken in
European waters of late years; it seems very probable, however, that
the “Black-Whale” of the temperate shores of N. America (the _B.
cisarctica_ of Cope) is identical with _B. biscayensis_, and that,
although extinct on the eastern side of the Atlantic, individuals from
the American waters occasionally find their way into the European
seas, where the race formerly existed as a native. The skeleton of
the Taranto specimen is now in the Museum of Comparative Anatomy of
the University of Naples, and M. F. Gasco states positively that
“both the Taranto Whale and that of Philadelphia (_B. cisarctica_,
Cope) belong to the species _B. biscayensis_, of Eschricht, which,
for several centuries was pursued with avidity--I was going to say
exterminated--throughout the temperate regions of the North Atlantic,
first by the Basques, and then successively by the Saintongeois, the
Normans, the Dutch (who called it _Nordkaper_), the Danes, Norwegians,
English, and Americans.”[26] The cervical vertebræ in the British
Museum, which form the type of Gray’s _Halibalæna britannica_ are also
believed to belong to this species.
Dr. Gray did not recognize _Balæna biscayensis_ as a good species,
and accounted for the absence of the Right-Whales, formerly found in
British waters, from the disturbed state of the seas, owing to the
great increase in traffic of ships, and especially steam-vessels,
which, he said, “appears to restrict their visits, and especially
their breeding, more to the Arctic portion; thus some Whales, which
were formerly said to be common on the coast of Britain, as the
Right-Whales, no longer visit this country.” Eschricht, however, as
before stated, has clearly shown that the habits of the northern
Right-Whale and localities frequented by them have remained unchanged
for many years, as proved by the record kept at the whaling-stations
established by the Danish government on the west coast of Greenland.
It is worthy of remark, that in the Southern ocean there are said to be
two species of Right-Whale, one _Caperea antipodorum_ (Gray), not found
further north than 40° south latitude; the other, _Eubalæna australis_
(Gray), found as near the equator as 20° south latitude.
The illustration at p. 60 is a reduced copy of the coloured plate
in Capellini’s account of the Taranto Whale (_‘Della Balena di
Taranto,’ G. Capellini, Bologna_, 1877), the original of which was a
carefully-executed water-colour drawing, made from the animal itself.
_BALÆNOPTERIDÆ._
THE HUMP-BACKED WHALE.
The next family, _Balænopteridæ_, is represented by two genera,
_Megaptera_ and _Balænoptera_. Like the Right-whales, they all have two
blow-holes, but may readily be distinguished by having the throat and
belly curiously marked with longitudinal furrows, like the ribs in a
worsted stocking: they also possess a well-defined dorsal fin.
The HUMP-BACKED WHALE, _Megaptera longimana_ (Rudolphi), the only
member of the first genus known to occur in the British seas, has
been recorded at least three times; first at Newcastle in September,
1839, again in the estuary of the Dee, in 1863, and in Wick Bay,
Caithnesshire, in March, 1871. Capt. Gray tells me they are not
uncommon off the east coast of Scotland in summer, and that he has
known several captured off Peterhead, three having been brought in
in one season. It is possible other examples may have been mistaken
for Rorquals, from which this species may at once be distinguished
externally by the great length of its flippers, which are white and
very conspicuous.
Herr Collett says that this species is met with every spring, on the
northern coast of Norway, particularly in the Varanger Fjord; although
generally occurring in small numbers, it is occasionally found in great
quantities. On one occasion a steam vessel was surrounded by them
as far as the eye could see, and great care had to be used to avoid
running against them. South of the polar circle, he says it only occurs
in small numbers.[27] In August, 1880, Capt. Gray saw vast numbers
of these Whales about one hundred miles N.E. of Iceland; the sea, he
states, seemed to be quite full of them as far as he could see from the
mast-head. They were accompanied by a small species of “Finner,” with a
white band across the fin (_B. rostrata_).
The total length of the animal is about 45 to 50 feet, its baleen is
black, and the flippers, which are white and notched at the edge, from
10 to 14 feet in length.
THE COMMON RORQUAL.
To the genus _Balænoptera_ belong the Rorquals or Fin-whales, the
first species of which is the COMMON RORQUAL, _Balænoptera musculus_
(Linn.), the _Balænoptera boops_ of Bell’s first edition, and _Physalus
antiquorum_ of Gray. This is a much more active animal than the
Right-whale; it is difficult of approach, and, upon being harpooned,
such is the velocity with which it shoots through the water that the
danger is very great; Scoresby mentions one which took out 480 fathoms
of line in about one minute. In addition to this, the whalebone is
short and of little value, and the yield of oil small; it is therefore
avoided by the whalers, as more dangerous than profitable, and if
struck at all, it is most likely a case of mistaken identity. From
the port of Vadsö, however, the capture of this, and the species
immediately preceding and following, is now successfully effected by
means of an explosive shell or harpoon, which kills them at once. This
fishery was established about the year 1865, by Herr Svend Foyn, from
Tonsberg, and is still very successfully prosecuted, as many as 50
Whales being obtained each summer; they are towed into Vadsö, where the
blubber is refined and the carcase made into manure.
[Illustration: Fig. 14. COMMON RORQUAL (_Balænoptera musculus_, Linn.)]
The habitat of the Common Rorqual is the temperate Northern seas,
from the Mediterranean, which it sometimes enters, to the 70° north
latitude, and sometimes even farther north still. Nordenskiöld, in the
‘Œolus,’ last saw Finners on the 18th May, 1861, in lat. 75° 45′, the
temperature of the water being between 2·50° and 3·8° C., and they were
not again seen until the return of the expedition in September, in 78°
north latitude, the temperature of the water being then about 3·8° C.
He remarks, “It is probable that ‘Finners’ never live in colder water
than this, and that the northern limit of their distribution coincides
with sea of this temperature. It has to be kept in view, however, that
this boundary line lies several degrees further to the north in summer
than in winter.”[28]
The range of this group is very great, and, according to Andrew
Murray, it would appear that one or more of the Balænopteridæ is
found over the whole world, although it is by no means certain that
any particular species has a very wide geographical range. _Megaptera
longimana_, which occurs in the North Sea, was also supposed to have
been met with at the Cape, but Dr. Gray has pointed out differences
in the cervical vertebræ of an individual from that locality, which
he considers constitute distinct specific characters; on the other
hand, a Fin-whale from Java so closely resembles our _Balænoptera
laticeps_ that Professor Flower, after the most careful examination and
comparison almost bone by bone, hesitates to pronounce it distinct,
and only separates it provisionally. In our own seas this species is
of frequent occurrence, more especially on the Scotch coast, where
it appears in the early autumn, attracted by the shoals of herring
which abound there at that season. In feeding, the Rorquals are not
so restricted to minute marine animals as the Right-Whale, but devour
large quantities of fish of various sizes, from herrings up to cod. In
the stomach of the Newcastle Humpbacked Whale (the species mentioned
immediately before the present one) were found six cormorants, but a
seventh, found in its throat, was supposed to have caused its death by
choking it. The blowing is accompanied by a loud noise, which, on a
still night, may be heard at a considerable distance. It was formerly
supposed that in “blowing” the Whale ejected from its nostrils a very
considerable quantity of water, which might be seen to spout up into
the air like a fountain; and in the performance of this remarkable feat
they were generally depicted. Beale, however, in his ‘Natural History
of the Sperm Whale,’ as early as 1838, showed that this is not the
case, and the truth of his observations is now generally acknowledged.
The power so to eject water taken into its capacious mouth is, of
course, impossible, the blow-hole being in direct communication with
the lungs, and not with the cavity of the mouth, nor would it be of
any service to the Whalebone-Whales, as the very purpose of the baleen
is to form a screening apparatus through which the water is ejected,
leaving its minute prey behind; and in the toothed Whales it would not
be required. What appears like a jet of water is, in reality, dense
vapour--in fact, the breath issuing from the lungs of the animal,
highly charged with moisture, which becomes condensed upon exposure
to the atmosphere. It often happens, too, that the Whale lets off the
imprisoned air just before the blow-hole reaches the surface of the
water, or that a wave passes over it at the moment of respiration,
the water is thus dashed aside by the blast, and, probably, some of it
really carried up into the air, thus heightening the deceptive effect.
This species, when adult, reaches the length of about 70 feet, the
upper part is black, the throat and belly white and plaited, the
flippers black. The baleen is short and slate colour, veined with
streaks of darker shade, but growing lighter towards the inner edge.
Dead Whales, when stranded on the shore, after floating long at sea,
are generally greatly distended with gas, which generates rapidly
in the tissues after decomposition has set in; in such an inflated
condition only a very imperfect conception can be formed of the true
proportions of the vast beast. There is frequently, also, a great
protrusion of membrane from the mouth, arising from the same cause, and
other appearances in the male animal, due to the pressure of gas in the
abdominal cavity are generally faithfully portrayed in old books of
Natural History.
A Whale of this species, taken off the North coast of Scotland, in
April, 1880, was purchased by an enterprising individual in Birmingham,
to which town it was conveyed by rail, and there exhibited: probably,
this was the greatest distance from the sea at which an entire
Cetacean, 63 feet in length, had ever been seen.
The figure of this species is copied, by kind permission of Professor
Flower, from the illustration to his paper in the ‘Proceedings of the
Zoological Society of London’ for 1869, p. 604, _et. seq._
SIBBALD’S RORQUAL.
SIBBALD’S RORQUAL (_Balænoptera sibbaldii_, J. E. Gray; also
_Sibbaldius borealis_, Gray, and _Physalus latirostris_, Flower), has
several times been met with in British waters, particularly on the
east coast of Scotland. It is the largest of this gigantic family,
measuring from 80 to perhaps 100 feet in length. One seen by Herr Foyn
he estimated at the enormous length of 133 English feet! The famous
“Ostend Whale,” which was found floating dead in the North Sea, in
1827, and taken into Ostend, belonged to this species; its skeleton
was long exhibited in this country, and afterwards in America. Dr.
Gray says it is now in St. Petersburg, and gives the total length
as 102 feet; as, however, several of the vertebræ are missing, the
exact length is uncertain. Professor Turner gives the length of a
specimen stranded in the Firth of Forth as 78 feet 9 inches, and the
girth behind the flippers about 45 feet: this animal was gravid, but
notwithstanding this fact, the bulk must have been enormous.
Herr Rt. Collett, in his ‘Norges Pattedyrfauna,’ gives a very full
account of this species, as observed by him on the Norwegian coast.
In June, 1874, he had the opportunity of visiting Herr Svend Foyn’s
establishment for whale-catching, at Vadsö, and in addition to being
enabled to examine three individuals of this species in a fresh state,
received much information as to their habits from Herr Foyn and the men
engaged in the fishery. This Whale, from its colour, is known by the
fishers as the “Blue Whale,” and appears to have its home in winter
in the open seas, between the North Cape and Spitsbergen. By the end
of April or beginning of May it approaches the coast, entering the
larger Fjords towards the end of the latter month, to feast upon the
enormous quantities of _Thysanopoda inermis_, then found there; it is
also seen in summer along the coast from Loffoden to the North Cape,
and further to the eastward. When the wind is on the land or in any
stormy weather, it seeks the open sea. Varanger Fjord is the favourite
hunting-ground for this species, and in the last few years the average
number taken there has been thirty; in 1874, as many as 42 were taken:
it leaves the Fjord, however, should stormy weather set in. No specimen
examined by Herr Collett, or Professor Sars, had taken any other food
than _Thysanopoda inermis_, and Herr Foyn and his catchers are all of
opinion that they do not eat fish. To obtain the little Crustacean on
which they feed and which is found congregated in separate masses,
the Whale passes backwards and forwards with its mouth open, till
the cavity is well filled, it then closes its capacious jaws upon
the contents. Herr Collett found two or three barrels of these small
crustaceans in the stomach of a Blue Whale which he examined, and was
told that a large one would consume as much as ten barrels.
The female appears, as a rule, to be longer than the male; the young
are born about the autumn, one appears to be the usual number, but two
young ones have more than once been seen with the same old female.
This species may be known by its low dorsal fin, black baleen, and long
flippers, which are black above and whitish below: this should be borne
in mind, as it is not at all improbable that some, at least, of the
enormous cetaceans which are occasionally reported from the North of
Scotland, belong to this species; so very unsatisfactory, however, are
the reports which appear in print, that it is rarely a single feature
is mentioned by which the species may be determined.
RUDOLPHI’S RORQUAL.
RUDOLPHI’S RORQUAL (_Balænoptera laticeps_, J. E. Gray) is a small
species which may readily be mistaken for the Lesser Rorqual. A Whale
stranded at Charmouth in February, 1840, and described by Mr. Yarrell,
under the name of _Balænoptera boops_, in the proceedings of the
Zoological Society for that year, is believed to have been of this
species, but the skeleton, although prepared at the time, is supposed
to have been sold and converted into manure. The same individual is
recorded under the name of _B. tenuirostris_, in the Mag. of Nat.
History, iv., 1840, p. 342, by Mr. R. H. Sweeting. Very little is known
about the history or distribution of this species; the flippers are
entirely black above, wanting the white band found in the next species,
and the baleen is believed to be black.
LESSER RORQUAL.
The next and last of the Whalebone-Whales which we know to have
occurred in the British Seas is the LESSER RORQUAL (_Balænoptera
rostrata_, Fab.; _Rorqualus minor_, Knox), (Fig. 15). Many individuals
of this species have been obtained on various parts of the coast,
from Cornwall to the North of Scotland. On the coast of Norway it is
frequently met with, and is there called the “Bay-Whale,” from its
habit of entering bays and estuaries; this habit the natives take
advantage of for its destruction. Stretching a strong net across the
inlet, they cut off its escape, and put a cruel and often protracted
end to its existence with harpoons and arrows, the poor Whale sometimes
lingering from eight to fourteen days. This species is also known as
the “Summer-Whale,” and does not appear to be so strictly a northern
species as the Balænopteridæ generally are: it is believed, like the
Common Rorqual, to have been taken in the Mediterranean. A Whale of
this species, taken at Mevagissey, in Cornwall, at the end of April,
1880, was conveyed to London, and there exhibited in the Old Kent Road.
The Lesser Rorqual, from its small size (not exceeding 30 feet), is
not liable to be mistaken for any other species except the preceding
(Rudolphi’s Rorqual), and from that it may be distinguished by the
broad white band across its black flipper; the baleen also is nearly
white, which is another good distinction. The figure of this species
is copied from the illustration to an article by Messrs. Carte
and Macalister, on the Anatomy of _Balænoptera rostrata_, in the
‘Philosophical Transactions’ of the Royal Society for 1868, vol. clviii.
[Illustration: Fig. 15. LESSER RORQUAL (_Balænoptera rostrata_, Fab.)]
In the table on the next page I have endeavoured to give the most
striking external peculiarities of our British _Mystacoceti_. They are
easily remembered, and will be useful in identifying specimens, should
no authority be at hand. The table also indicates the external points
to be observed by a person not acquainted with this class of animals,
and is most serviceable to enable others to identify doubtful specimens.
TABLE OF DIFFERENCES OF BRITISH MYSTACOCETI (WHALEBONE WHALES).
+------------------------+---------------+---------+-----------------+
| | COLOUR. | | |
| SPECIES. + ------+-------+Belly and| Flippers. |
| | Upper | Under | Throat. | |
| | Part. | Part. | | |
+------------------------+-------+-------+---------+-----------------+
| _Balæna mysticetus_, | Dark | Throat| Smooth | Black |
|Greenland Right-Whale | grey | white | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| _Balæna biscayensis_, |Uniform|Uniform| Smooth | Black |
| Atlantic Right-Whale | black | black | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| _Megaptera longimana_, |Black | Black | Plaited | Wholly white,|
| Humpbacked Whale | | and | (plicæ) |about 12 ft. long|
| | | white | |and notched at |
| | | | |the edge |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera musculus_, |Black | White | Plaited | Black |
| Common Rorqual | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera sibbaldii_,|Black | Slate | Plaited |Dark above, |
| Sibbald’s Rorqual | | grey | | White beneath, |
| | | | | 12 feet or more|
| | | | | long |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera laticeps_, |Black | White | Plaited | Upper part |
| Rudolphi’s Rorqual | | | | black |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera rostrata_, |Black | White | Plaited |Black, with |
| Lesser Rorqual | | | | broad band of |
| | | | | white across |
+------------------------+-------+-------+---------+-----------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| | | BALEEN. | |
| SPECIES. | Dorsal |----------+------------+ Total |
| | Fin. | Length. | Colour. | Length. |
| | | | | |
+------------------------+--------+ ---------+------------+-----------+
| _Balæna mysticetus_, | None |Long and | Blackish | 50 or 60 |
|Greenland Right-Whale | | narrow; | grey | feet |
| | | 10 or 12| | |
| | | feet | | |
| | | | | |
| _Balæna biscayensis_, | None |Shorter | ... |40 feet (?)|
| Atlantic Right-Whale | | than the| | |
| | | above | | |
| | | | | |
| _Megaptera longimana_, |Very low| Short | Black |About |
| Humpbacked Whale | | | | 50 feet |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera musculus_, |Distinct| Short |Slate |About 70 |
| Common Rorqual | | | colour-- | feet |
| | | | shaded | |
| | | | lighter to| |
| | | | inner | |
| | | | edge | |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera sibbaldii_,|Very low| Short |Rich | 80 to 100 |
| Sibbald’s Rorqual | | | black | feet |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera laticeps_, | ? | Short | Black (?) | 30 or 40 |
| Rudolphi’s Rorqual | | | | feet |
| | | | | |
|_Balænoptera rostrata_, | High | Short | Yellowish | 25 to 30 |
| Lesser Rorqual | | | white | feet |
| | | | | |
+------------------------+--------+----------+------------+-----------+
[Illustration: Fig. 16. Sperm Whale (_Physeter macrocephalus_, Linn.)]
ODONTOCETI (TOOTHED WHALES).
_PHYSETERIDÆ._
The second sub-order into which the Cetacea are divided, is the
_Odontoceti_, or Toothed Whales. In this section, baleen is never
present, but well-developed teeth are found in one or both jaws of
the adult; in some species they are very numerous; sometimes, though
rarely, deciduous. The blow-hole is single, and the skull generally
asymmetrical, or not precisely alike on both sides of the medial line.
Professor Flower divides the _Odontoceti_ into three families, one of
which, the _Platanistidæ_, as already said, is found only in India
and South America: the other two, _Physeteridæ_ and _Delphinidæ_, are
represented in our Fauna by about fifteen species.
Of the _Physeteridæ_, four genera are represented in the British fauna
by four or five species; namely, one _Physeter_, the Sperm Whale; two
_Hyperoodon_, the common Beaked Whale, and a doubtful species called
the Broad-fronted Beaked Whale; one _Ziphius_, Cuvier’s Whale; and one
_Mesoplodon_, Sowerby’s Whale.
SPERM WHALE, OR CACHELOT.
By far the most conspicuous species of this interesting group is the
SPERM WHALE, _Physeter macrocephalus_ (Linnæus), which rivals the
Right-Whale in commercial importance, and in the value of its products.
This species has a very wide geographical range, having been found
in almost every sea between lat. 60° north and 60° south. The attempt
has been made, I think unsuccessfully, to show that the Sperm Whale of
the Southern Hemisphere is distinct from that of the northern; there
seems, however, no reason, at present, to doubt, although, of course,
it may eventually be found otherwise, that the same species of Sperm
Whale ranges over the whole of this vast tract of ocean. North of
about 40° it appears to be only a straggler, and although the Arctic
seas are almost always stated by authors to be its head-quarters, very
few well-authenticated instances of its occurrence farther north than
Scotland are on record; Lilljeborg excludes it from his account of the
Scandinavian Cetacea, but Herr Collett says that within the last 100
years, at least two individuals of this species have been stranded
on the Norwegian coast, and that Professor Sars, during a stay in
Loffoden, received information which convinced him that one was seen
there in the summer of 1865.
From the middle of the sixteenth to the middle of the seventeenth
century, the stranding of individuals of this species on the coast
of Great Britain, and, indeed, of other countries in Europe from the
Netherlands to the Mediterranean, was by no means a rare occurrence;
these were generally solitary males, but occasionally small “schools”
were met with, as in July, 1577, in the Scheldt, where three were
taken; also, at Hunstanton, in Norfolk, in 1646, mentioned below.
Of its occurrence on the British coast there are numerous instances;
in all cases, however, they are believed by Andrew Murray to have been
stragglers, “which have rounded Cape Horn (they have never been known
to double the Cape of Good Hope) or unpromising colonies, for they are
becoming scarcer and scarcer in more than their due proportion.”[29]
Eight or ten individuals of this species have occurred on the coast of
Scotland between the years 1689 and 1871 (Alston, ‘Fauna of Scot.’, p.
18).
[Illustration: Fig. 17. Chair in Great Yarmouth Church, formed from the
basal portion of the skull of the Sperm Whale.]
[Illustration: Fig. 18. Back view of the same.]
In the church of St. Nicholas, at Great Yarmouth, is the basal portion
of a skull of this animal, which has been converted into a chair: it
formerly stood outside the church, and of course, as it was an object
of wonder, it was relegated to the powers of darkness, and _christened_
(?) the “Devil’s Seat;” it has, however, now been admitted into mother
church, and stands beside the north-west door under the clock. In the
churchwardens’ accounts for 1606 there is a charge of 8s. for painting
this chair, which clearly proves its antiquity. In a letter to Sir
Thomas Browne (Wilkins’ edit., 1852, editor’s preface to “Pseudodoxia,”
vol. i. p. lxxxi.), Sir Hamon L’Estrange writes that in June, 1626, a
Whale, afterwards referred to by Sir T. Browne as a Sperm Whale (vol.
iii. p. 324), was cast upon his shore or sea-liberty, “some-tyme parcel
of the possessions of the Abbey of Ramsey, &c.” The same author, in his
account of the “Fishes found in Norfolk and on the Coast,” says, “A
Spermaceti Whale of 62 feet long [came on shore] near Wells, another
of the same kind twenty years before at Hunstanton [the one referred
to by Sir H. L’Estrange]; and not far off, eight or nine came ashore,
and two had young ones after they were forsaken by the water.” The
Whale mentioned by Sir H. L’Estrange came on shore in 1626; twenty
years after would give 1646 as the date of the Wells specimen; and
in December of that year, according to Booth’s “History of Norfolk,”
published in 1781 (vol. ix. p. 33), “A great Whale was cast on the
shore here [at Holme-next-the-Sea], the wind blowing strongly at the
north-west, 57 feet long, the breadth of the nose-end eight feet, from
nose-end to the eye 15½ feet; the eyes about the same bigness as those
of an ox, the lower chap closed and shut about four feet short of the
upper; this lower chap narrow towards the end, and therein were 46
teeth like the tusks of an elephant; the upper one had no teeth, but
sockets of bones to receive the teeth: two small fins only, one on
each side, and a short small fin on the back; it was a male ...; the
breadth of the tail, from one outward tip to the other, was 13½ feet.
The profit made of it was £217 6s. 7d., and the charge in cutting it
up and managing it came to £100 or more.” It seems probable that a
“school” got bewildered in the shallow waters of the Wash, and that the
individual of which Booth gives such an excellent description, formed
one of the same party as the eight or nine mentioned by Sir T. Browne.
In May, 1652, Mr. Arthur Bacon writes to Sir T. Browne about the Sperm
Whale cast on shore at Yarmouth, but the actual date of the occurrence
is not given. Since these ancient records, many others have occurred
at intervals, singly or in small parties, on various parts of the
coast; the last instance, I believe, being in July, 1871, when one was
stranded on the shore of the Isle of Skye.
[Illustration: Fig. 19. SKELETON OF THE SPERM WHALE (after Flower).
s, Spermaceti Cavity; n, Nasal Passage, in dotted line; b, Blow-hole.]
Of the osteology of the Sperm Whale, Professor Flower has given an
exhaustive description in a paper published in the ‘Transactions’
of the Zoological Society, vol. vi., and of its habits a very
interesting account is given by Thomas Beale, who, in the capacity of
surgeon on board ships employed in the South Sea fishery, had unusual
opportunities of observing this remarkable animal. He published a
book entitled ‘The Natural History of the Sperm Whale,’ to which I am
largely indebted for what I shall have to say about this species.
The colour of the Sperm Whale is black above and grey beneath, the
colours gradually shading into each other. The full-grown male is about
sixty feet long; the females are much smaller and more slender than the
males. The head, which constitutes more than one-third of the whole
of the animal, presents a very remarkable appearance, the truncated
form of the snout looking as though it were cut off at right angles
to the body: at the upper angle is situated the single blow-hole. The
juncture of the head with the body is the thickest portion, and the
body decreases little in size till the “hump,” which is situated in
the place of the dorsal fin, is reached; from this point it rapidly
diminishes to the tail. The flukes of the tail are from twelve to
fourteen feet in breadth, and the two flippers each about six feet
long. The under jaw is pointed, and about two feet shorter than the
upper; it is furnished with about twenty-five large conical teeth on
each side; but the number is not constant, nor is it always the same
on each side. In the upper jaw are no visible teeth, but those of the
lower jaw shut into corresponding depressions in the upper. The tongue
is small, and, like the lining of the mouth, of a white colour. The
upper part of the head, called the “case,” contains the “spermaceti,”
which upon the death of the animal granulates into a yellowish
substance. Beale says that a large Whale not unfrequently contains a
ton of spermaceti. Beneath the “case” is situated the “junk,” which
consists of a dense cellular mass, containing oil and spermaceti. The
blubber is about fourteen inches thick on the breast, and in most
other parts of the body from eight to eleven inches. By the whalers
this covering is called the “blanket.” With regard to the apparently
ungainly head of the Sperm Whale, Beale remarks as follows:--“One of
the peculiarities of the Sperm Whale, which strikes at first sight
every beholder, is the apparently disproportionate and unwieldy bulk of
the head; but this peculiarity, instead of being, as might be supposed,
an impediment to the freedom of the animal’s motion in its native
element, is, in fact, on the contrary, in some respects, very conducive
to its lightness and agility, if such a term can with propriety be
applied to such an enormous creature; for a great part of the bulk of
the head is made up of a thin membranous case, containing, during life,
a thin oil, of much less specific gravity than water, below which is
again the junk, which, although heavier than the spermaceti, is still
lighter than the element in which the Whale moves; consequently, the
head, taken as a whole, is lighter specifically than any other part of
the body, and will always have a tendency to rise at least so far above
the surface as to elevate the nostril or “blow-hole” sufficiently for
all purposes of respiration; and more than this, a very slight effort
on the part of the fish would only be necessary to raise the whole of
the anterior flat surface of the nose out of the water. In case the
animal should wish to increase his speed to the utmost, the narrow
inferior surface, which has been before stated to bear some resemblance
to the cutwater of a ship, and which would, in fact, answer the same
purpose to the Whale, would be the only part exposed to the pressure
of the water in front, enabling him thus to pass with the greatest
celerity and ease through the boundless track of his wide domain.[30]
When swimming at ease, the Sperm Whale keeps just below the surface
of the water, and goes at about three or four miles an hour; but on
an emergency it is able to attain a speed of ten or twelve miles an
hour: it then progresses by means of powerful lateral strokes of its
tail, and alternately rises and sinks at each stroke. In progressing
in this manner, the blunt anterior surface of the head never presents
itself directly to the water; the animal’s body being in an oblique
position, it is only the angle formed by the inferior surface which
first presents itself, and this, which Beale likens to the “cutwater”
of a ship, offers the least possible amount of resistance.
[Illustration: Fig. 20. SKULL OF SPERM WHALE.]
When undisturbed, the Sperm Whale rises to the surface to breathe about
once every hour. Beale says the regularity with which every action
connected with its breathing is performed is remarkable; the time
occupied differs slightly in each individual, but each one is minutely
regular in the performance of every action connected with respiration,
so that the whalers know how long it will remain beneath the surface
before reappearing to renew its supply of air. A full-grown “bull,”
he says, remains at the surface ten or eleven minutes, during which
he makes sixty or seventy expirations; after which he disappears, to
return again to the surface in one hour and ten minutes. The blowing
is not accompanied by any sound, and notwithstanding the wonderful
accounts of its roarings and bellowings, the Sperm Whale may be said
to be an absolutely silent animal. The females and young males are
gregarious, but are found in separate herds or “schools,” as they
are called. A “school” will sometimes consist of five or six hundred
individuals. The herds of females are always accompanied by from one to
three large “bulls;” but the full-grown males are said to be generally
solitary in their habits, except on certain occasions, when it is
supposed they are migrating from one feeding-place to another. The
majority of those which occur on our coast are these solitary males;
when they visit us in herds, as mentioned by Sir Thomas Browne, they
are all probably females or young males. The “bulls” are very fierce
and jealous, and fight fiercely. The females show great attachment to
each other and to their young, so much so that, one being wounded, the
others of the herd remain and fall a comparatively easy prey. The young
males, on the other hand, are very wary and difficult of approach,
and should one be attacked, the others immediately take the alarm and
retreat. The female produces one young one, rarely two, at a time, and
breeds at all seasons of the year. Their senses of sight and hearing
are very acute, and after being once unsuccessfully attacked, they are
very difficult and dangerous to approach.
The food of the Sperm Whale consists almost entirely of Cephalopode
Mollusks (cuttlefish), although at times, when feeding near the shore,
it has been known to take fish as large as salmon. How it contrives to
capture such active prey as fish seems difficult to conceive. Beale is
of opinion that the Whale sinks to a proper depth in the sea, where
remaining as quiet as possible, and opening wide its mouth, the prey
are attracted by the glistening white colour of its lining membrane,
curiosity leading them to destruction; for no sooner have a sufficient
number entered his mouth than the Whale rapidly closes his under jaw,
and they are made prisoners, and swallowed.
The pursuit of the Sperm Whale is attended with much greater danger
than that of the Greenland Whale, and Beale gives many instances
in which, in his own experience, boats were stove in and men lost;
stories of fighting Whales, he says, are numerous, and probably much
exaggerated; one, known as “Timor Jack,” is said to have destroyed
every boat sent against him, till at last he was killed by approaching
him from several directions at the same time, his attention thus being
diverted from the boat which made the successful attack. Another fish,
known as “New Zealand Tom,” destroyed nine boats successively before
breakfast, and when eventually captured, after destroying many other
boats, many harpoons from the various ships which had attacked him were
found sticking in his body. There is one well-authenticated instance of
a vessel being attacked and destroyed by a Sperm Whale: the American
whale-ship _Essex_ was attacked by one, which, first passing under the
vessel, probably by accident, came in contact with her keel and carried
it away: then turning and rushing furiously upon the ship, the Whale
stove in her bow; so serious was the breach that the vessel speedily
filled and went down. Most of the crew were away in their boats at the
time, but those on board had just time to launch their one remaining
boat before the vessel sank. The boats made for the coast of Peru, the
nearest land, many hundreds of miles distant; one of them was picked up
drifting at sea, and three of the crew, who were found in it in a state
of insensibility, were the only survivors of the ill-fated vessel.
In addition to the sperm and oil, this species yields another product
which is, or was, very valuable, although it is the result of disease,
and one would imagine a very uninviting substance--I refer to
_Ambergris_, the origin and composition of which was so long a puzzle
to the learned. This substance is now well known to be a concretion of
the indigestible portions of the Cuttlefish, which form the food of
the Sperm Whale. The nucleus of the mass is generally the horny beaks
of these creatures, and the substance itself is found in the intestines
of the Sperm Whale, or on the shores of the seas frequented by this
species: no other Whale is known to be subject to these bezoars. It
was formerly believed that the origin of ambergris was in some way
connected with the sea, and when it was afterwards found in Whales,
the fact was simply attributed to their having swallowed it. Sir
Thomas Browne writes of the Sperm Whale which came on shore at Wells,
in 1646:--“In vain was it to rake for ambergriese in the paunch of
this leviathan, as Greenland discoverers and attests of experience
dictate that they sometimes swallow great lumps thereof in the sea;
insufferable fœtor denying that inquiry; and yet if, as Paracelsus
encourageth, ordure makes the best musk, and from the most fœtid
substances may be drawn the most odoriferous essences; all that had
not Vespasian’s nose (_Cui odor lucri ex re qualibet_) might boldly
swear here was a subject fit for such extractions” (vol. i., p. 356).
It was not until 1783, in a paper read before the Royal Society by Dr.
Swediaur, that a scientific account of the origin of ambergris was made
known. At the present time its medical virtues, which were formerly
considered very great, are altogether at a discount, and the only use
to which it is applied is in the preparation of perfumery.
The South Sea whale-fishery was long prosecuted by the Americans before
the British ships took part in it, from 1771 to 1775 Massachusetts is
said by McCulloch to have had 121 vessels in this trade; about the
beginning of the American war, however, the English also sent out
ships, and in 1791 had 75 vessels engaged in the South Seas. The number
of British ships, as with those employed in the northern fisheries,
varied considerably, influenced probably by the varying amounts of
bounty offered by the Government, but never exceeded 75; in 1815 they
had fallen off to 22; in 1820 they again rose to 68, from which they
gradually fell to 31 in 1829, all of which sailed from the port of
London. Beale sailed from London, in 1831, in the “Kent,” returning in
the “Sarah and Elizabeth,” both of which vessels belonged to Thomas
Sturge. The duration of the voyage was from two to four or even five
years, the average of 199 voyages being three years and three months,
and the yield of oil, 169 tons per voyage. At the present time no
British vessels are engaged in the South Sea trade, which has again
reverted to the Americans.
I have said very little about the method of pursuit and capture of
this species, and of the Right-Whale, because it is a subject in
which I take no pleasure; those who wish to know how these peaceful
and highly-organised giants are approached, and how they behave when
terrified and smarting under the harpoon and whale-lance, can pursue
the subject _ad nauseam_ in the pages of Scoresby, Beale, and others;
the sickening process of “flensing” and disposing of the blubber is
described with equal minuteness. The halo of romance with which some
authors seek to surround the whale-fishery, is, doubtless, in a great
measure due to the solitary and distant fields of operation, whether
it be in the frozen regions of the north, or the vast and trackless
oceans of the south, but its stern reality is prosaic enough. The
occupation is one of hardship and danger, but the remuneration when
successful is large in proportion, and I can hardly conceive, under any
circumstances, of men inflicting the fearful amount of suffering which
every “full” whale-ship, or in a still greater degree every “full”
sealer, represents. Science is constantly adding to our resources, and
it is sincerely to be hoped that ere long substitutes may be found
for animal oil and whalebone which will supersede their use in the
few processes in which they are still requisite: should this be long
delayed, it is to be feared that the Seals and Whales, at least of
the northern seas, will soon cease to exist. In the meantime, it is
gratifying to find that it is from the sealers and whalers themselves
that the demand for the better regulation of the trade has emanated,
and the name of Captain David Gray, of Peterhead, stands prominent
amongst those who have urged upon the governments of this and other
countries concerned, such regulations as shall insure greater humanity
in its prosecution, and prevent the wasteful destruction which,
if continued, must speedily ruin a valuable source of commercial
enterprise.
Although so widely spread over the waters of the globe, possessing, I
believe, a range greater than any other known mammal, it is only open
and deep waters which can be said to be the home of the Sperm Whale;
when found in shallow seas, its generally emaciated condition indicates
the absence of its proper nourishment; and the readiness with which
whole herds precipitate themselves stupidly upon the sands, shows how
little they are acquainted with such objects. Mr. Andrew Murray makes
some observations upon this subject, which are so interesting and so
suggestive that I cannot resist making a long quotation.
Speaking of those specimens which have now and then been cast ashore in
the North Atlantic or in the English seas, he says: “They seem to be
unprepared for, or not adapted for, shallow seas. Accustomed (perhaps
not individually, but by hereditary practice or instinct) to swim along
the coral islands of the Pacific within a stone’s throw from the shore,
they cannot understand, their instinct is not prepared to meet, shallow
coasts and projecting headlands. If they were habitual residents in
our seas, they must either be speedily extirpated, learn more caution,
or be developed into a new species.” ... Mr. Murray further says: “I
observe that almost every place that has been above mentioned as a
favourite resort of the Sperm Whales, although not out of soundings,
has claims to be considered the site of submerged land. The islands in
the Polynesia, which are its special feeding-ground, are the beacons
left by the submerged Pacific continent. In pure deep seas animal life
is usually scarce, and the absence of breeding-ground is probably the
chief cause of it; but this only applies to a certain kind of animals,
those which require a bottom on which to deposit their spawn; but there
are many which do not require this. The spawn of some floats about
unattached; for others a frond of weed is sufficient attachment; and
it has occurred to me that the distribution of the Sperm Whale may in
some way be connected with the geological antecedents of the ocean it
inhabits. I think it not improbable that the site of a submerged land
may swarm with life, which originally proceeded, or was dependent on
it, long after it had been in the deep bosom of the ocean buried. The
Sargasso seas, which swarm with _Eolidæ_ and _Crustacea_, are examples
of this life; it is not invariably either present or absent in deep
water, and it is its presence or its absence which is instructive.
Those animals which required a bottom to spawn upon may have died out
or been developed into others which do not; and those which do not
require such a support may have multiplied correspondingly. In one of
the maps in Lieutenant Maury’s book, already cited, there is a space
of sea opposite the western coast of South America, and lying between
Patagonia and New Zealand, marked ‘Desolate region, distinguished
by the absence of animal or vegetable life’;--no Sperm Whales
here--nothing for them to feed upon--and no symptoms, either by banks
of Sargasso or coral islets, of any land ever having existed there.
There is no apparent reason why this place, except from some special
cause peculiar to itself, should be more desolate than any other in the
same latitude--than the deep sea on the east side of Patagonia, for
example. I can imagine that, if the bottom of the sea should subside
gradually, where animal life had once abounded, animal life--not that
animal life, but animal life due in some way to it--might continue
to linger over it long after it had passed beyond the depth at which
it could practically have any effect upon the animal life above it;
but if a part of the circumference of the globe has always been under
water, before and ever since the creation of life, no life is likely
to be found on that spot, because it has never had a starting-point
of life from which to begin; and, as already said, a slender barrier
stops the spread of species, and species would certainly not spread to
a spot where there was nothing for them to feed upon. Again, animal
life could not begin to feed upon animal life till vegetable life had
previously prepared the way, by providing food for the animals which
were to furnish food for others; and vegetable life could not begin to
grow without a foundation of land, accessible either above or below
water. The total and constant absence of all life at any particular
spot appears to me, therefore, to furnish a presumption that there has
never been dry land or shallow water there. Whether the continuance of
deep water in one spot for some interminably long time might not have
the same effect is another question, which, whatever way it may be
answered, would not affect my explanation of the cause of the absence
of the Sperm Whale from such spots.”[31]
The woodcuts (figs. 17 and 18), representing the chair in Yarmouth
Church, which is formed of part of the skull of an individual of this
species, are from the ‘Purlestrations of Great Yarmouth,’ by Mr. C. J.
Palmer.
THE ZIPHIOID WHALES.
The sub-family _Ziphiinæ_, which follows next, is, perhaps, the most
remarkable of the whole of this interesting order. The _Ziphioid_
Whales, as they are designated, are, for the most part, very rare, and
until the commencement of the present century, with one exception, were
known to science only from their numerous remains, found chiefly in the
Crag deposits. Even so recently as 1871, Professor Flower, in a memoir
of this group[32] speaks of their occurrence at irregular intervals,
and at various and most distant parts of the world, to the number of
about 30 individuals, in all cases solitary, and that their habits were
almost absolutely unknown. Since that time, however, very considerable
additions have been made to our knowledge of the group, and Professor
Flower, in a second contribution on the same subject[33] made in 1877,
states that “instead of being so rare as was then supposed, since the
attention of naturalists resident in our colonies has been directed to
the importance of losing no opportunity of securing such specimens as
accidents of wind and waves may cast upon their shores, it has been
proved that in the seas of the Southern Hemisphere these Whales exist
in considerable numbers, both as species and as individuals, and that
one species, at least [_Mesoplodon grayi_] is gregarious, having been
met with in two instances in ‘schools’ of considerable numbers.” “The
geographical distribution of the group,” adds Professor Flower[34] “has
a very great interest in relation to that of many other Australian
groups, both of vertebrates and invertebrates. Among the earliest known
remains of Cetacea, in the Belgian and Suffolk Crags, _Mesoplodon_
and closely-allied forms are most abundant. Up to a little more than
ten years ago, the few stray individuals of _Mesoplodon bidens_
occasionally stranded on the shores of North Europe, were supposed to
be their sole survivors. Since that time it has been proved that they
are still numerous in species, and even in individuals ... in the seas
which surround the Australian continent, extending from the Cape of
Good Hope on the one side, to New Zealand on the other, though beyond
these limits no specimens have yet been met with. It is the history
of the Marsupial Mammals, of _Ceratodus_, of _Terebratula_, and of
numerous other forms.”
The group is divided into four genera--_Hyperoodon_, _Berardius_,
_Ziphius_, and _Mesoplodon_ (the second of which is not represented in
our Fauna). Its members were formerly distinguished by the absence
of functional teeth in the upper jaw, but, recently, a row of small
teeth, of determinate number and definite form, has been discovered
in many individuals of a species of _Mesoplodon_. The teeth in the
lower jaw are always quite rudimentary, with the exception of one, or
occasionally, two pairs. These may be largely developed, especially
in the male sex, and are placed, generally, well forward. “They have
a small and pointed enamel-covered crown, composed of true dentine,
which, instead of surmounting a root of the ordinary character, is
raised upon a solid mass of osteo-dentine, the continuous growth of
which greatly alters the form and general appearance of the organ as
age advances.” In _Mesoplodon layardi_ this little dentine cap is not
larger than the portion of the tooth ordinarily shown above the gum,
but the fang-like growth is so great that the tips of the “tusks” meet
over the upper jaw, so that the animal is only able to open its mouth
for a very short distance indeed. The form assumed in _Mesoplodon
bidens_ will be seen in the figure of the head of that species, at p.
104. The blow-hole is sub-crescentic, and a pair of remarkable furrows
occurs in the skin of the throat, almost in the form of the letter V,
the point directed forward. The skull presents a remarkable appearance
in the genus _Hyperoodon_, caused by the enormous maxillary crests
which produce the peculiar conformation of the head in the living
animal, originating the trivial name “Bottle-head.” The food of the
whole group is said to consist mainly of _Loligo_, commonly called
“Squid,” and other Cephalopods which frequent the open sea.
One very singular circumstance with regard to these creatures is that
they never seem to be taken at sea, but, whenever procured, it is by
their running themselves on shore. This, as before remarked with regard
to the Sperm Whale, would seem to indicate that their natural habitat
is the deep waters of the open seas, where shallows are unknown. The
sand-banks which surround a sloping shore, of which they have had no
experience, speedily prove fatal to them.
BEAKED WHALE.
The common BEAKED WHALE, or BOTTLE-HEAD (_Hyperoodon rostratum_,
Chemnitz; _Hyperoodon butzkopf_, Lacépède), is of frequent occurrence
in the North Atlantic, and generally visits our shores in autumn,
sometimes ascending the estuaries of rivers: it has been taken several
times at the entrance to the river Ouse. It is solitary in its habits,
more than two being never met with in the same place, and in that
case it is often the old female and her young one: the old male is
said to be very shy and rarely secured. In September, 1877, an adult
female, 24 ft. long, was taken in the Menai Straits; it was accompanied
by another, probably its young one. Capt. Feilden met with what he
believes to have been this species, just within the Arctic Circle;
“each emission of breath was accompanied by a stentorian grunt, which
closely resembled that of an elephant.”[35]
The colour is black above, the under parts being lighter: the two teeth
in the lower jaw are generally hidden in the gum. Its food consists of
cuttlefish, the remains of great numbers of which have been found in
its stomach.
BROAD-FRONTED BEAKED WHALE.
Another species of _Hyperoodon_, for which the name _H. latifrons_
has been proposed, is by some supposed to exist. Scarcely anything is
known about it as a species. “The principal distinctive characters of
the skull lie in the great raised crests of the maxillary bones, which
are very much thickened and flattened above, so as almost to touch
one another, whereas, in _H. rostratum_, they are rather sharp-edged
above, and separated by a considerable interval. In _H. latifrons_,
these crests rise absolutely _higher_ than the occipital region of the
skull, which is not the case in the common species.”[36] Individuals
possessing these peculiarities have been taken three or four times
on the British coast, and on one occasion, in Greenland. Another
was stranded in 1873, at Hasvig, near Hammerfest, and identified by
Professor Sars from its remains; its length was 30 feet (Norse), and
the colour dark on the back, but lighter beneath.[37] It has, however,
been suggested, with much probability, by Eschricht, that these
individuals are, after all, only the males of the preceding species;
for all the specimens with broad crests, of which the sex was noted,
were males.
CUVIER’S WHALE.
CUVIER’S WHALE (_Ziphius cavirostris_, Cuv.; _Epiodon desmarestii_,
J. E. Gray, ‘Cat. Seals and Whales’), another of this remarkable
group, has been met with once on the coast of Shetland, and it, or
its remains, have been found about five or six times in other parts
of Europe, and also, it is believed, at the Cape of Good Hope, the
east coast of South America, and New Zealand. Professor Turner is of
opinion that the geographical range of _Ziphius cavirostris_ equals
that possessed by the Spermaceti Whale.[38] In colour this species is
believed to resemble Sowerby’s Whale; it has two teeth, one on each
side of the lower jaw, close to the extremity.
[Illustration: Fig. 21. HEAD OF SOWERBY’S WHALE (_Mesoplodon
sowerbiensis_, De Blainville).
From Trans. Roy. Irish Acad.]
Cuvier established the genus _Ziphius_ in 1825, from a fossil skull
found on the coast of Provence in 1804, which he believed at the time
to belong to an extinct animal.
SOWERBY’S WHALE.
One more British Ziphioid is known, SOWERBY’S WHALE (_Mesoplodon
sowerbiensis_, De Blainville); it was first described from a specimen
which came ashore at Brodie, Elginshire, in 1800, and has since been
found three times in Ireland; there is also a skull in the Museum of
Science and Art at Edinburgh, which belonged to a specimen believed to
have been captured somewhere on the Scotch coast; the remains of five
others are preserved in various Continental museums.
Of the individual which came on shore on the coast of Kerry, in March,
1864, Mr. Andrews has given a description in the “Transactions of the
Royal Irish Academy,” for April, 1867. Fortunately, it came under
the notice of Dr. Busteed, of Castle Gregory, who being interested
in zoology, and aware of the great importance of the occurrence,
photographed the head in several positions while it was yet fresh: Dr.
Busteed’s photographs were reproduced in the Transactions of the Royal
Irish Academy. The head had unfortunately been removed immediately
behind the frontal portion of the skull, the base of which is lost,
as are also the other parts of the skeleton. The total length of the
animal was about fifteen feet, the two teeth largely developed and
projecting like the tusks of a boar. On the under part of the throat
the V-shaped furrow was very conspicuous. Sowerby’s specimen was
coloured black above, and nearly white below. The skin was smooth like
satin. “Immediately under the cuticle the sides were completely covered
with white vermicular streaks in every direction, which at a little
distance appeared like irregular cuts with a sharp instrument.”
_DELPHINIDÆ._
The remaining family, _Delphinidæ_, as before stated, is a very
numerous one. It has ten representatives in the British fauna,
contained in seven genera, the first of which, according to the
arrangement I have adopted, is that of _Monodon_.
THE NARWHAL.
The NARWHAL (_Monodon monoceros_, Linn.) is a native of the Polar seas
seldom leaving the ice; stragglers have occurred three times on the
British coast, one in 1648 in the Firth of Forth, another came ashore
alive at Boston, in 1800; the third was taken in Shetland in 1808.
This species is very numerous in the frozen seas to the north of
latitude 65°, and is remarkable for the enormous development in the
male of the left canine tooth, which is projected forward in the form
of a tusk or spear, reaching to the length of six or eight feet, while
the right tusk remains abortive, and does not pierce the alveolus. The
spear is of fine compact ivory, hollow for the greater part of its
length, grooved spirally from left to right, along its outer surface,
the spiral generally making five or six turns, but smooth at the end,
and bluntly pointed. Although the right canine is rarely developed, a
few examples have occurred in which both tusks were present; the female
is very rarely furnished with this appendage.
Mr. J. W. Clark, in a paper on a ‘Skeleton of Narwhal, with two
fully-developed tusks,’[39] writes as follows:--“The skulls of the
Toothed Whales are generally asymmetrical, being twisted more or less,
usually towards the left. This peculiarity is especially observable in
Monodon. One would expect it to be greatly exaggerated in the skulls
of the males, where the left tusk alone is developed, and the left
maxillary is, in consequence, very large, and the right proportionately
small; but it does not seem to be affected by the absence or presence
of the teeth. Female skulls, where neither tusk is developed, are
equally twisted, and so are the bidental skulls ... the increased size
of the right maxillary does not appear to affect the rest of the skull.”
Mr. Clark enumerates eleven skulls of the Narwhal in which both tusks
are developed; four at Copenhagen, and one each in the museum of
Hamburg, Christiania, Amsterdam, Weimar, Hull, Paris, and Cambridge; to
these must be added a twelfth, which was brought from Prince Regent’s
Inlet, by Capt. Gravill, of the “Camperdown,” and is now in the Dundee
Museum.
Not long since I saw preserved in a country mansion, the tusk of a
Narwhal measuring 7 ft. 5 in. long; it was carefully kept in a long
case resembling a barber’s pole, and bore a ticket attached, which
stated that it was “Bequeathed in 1561 by the Countess of ----, to her
daughter ----.” No doubt at the time this formed a valuable bequest,
as even royal and ecclesiastical dignitaries are said to have esteemed
these strange objects (probably associated with the mythical unicorn),
as “good against” poisons and fevers, and prized them accordingly. The
use of this remarkable appendage appears very doubtful; it has been
conjectured that it serves to stir up food from the bottom of the sea,
in which case the female would be badly off without it; or that it is
employed to keep breathing-holes open in the ice, and an instance is
related in support of this view, in which hundreds were seen at an
ice-hole protruding their heads to breathe, but it is not clear whether
they made the hole for themselves, or whether they were attracted by
it, particularly as there were numbers of White Whales with them. It
seems certain, however, that the tusk, which is frequently found in a
broken condition, is used for purposes of attack and defence. Like the
horn of the stag, it is, no doubt, a sexual distinction.
The Narwhal is very social in its habits, great numbers being often
met with together; its food consists of cuttlefish and crustaceans.
The length of the full-grown animal is about 16 feet, the upper parts
gray, the sides and belly white, and the whole animal spotted with
black and gray. The only authentic figure of the Narwhal with which I
am acquainted is that given by Scoresby; this is so well known from
frequent reproduction that it is not necessary to give it here.
THE WHITE WHALE.
The WHITE WHALE, or BELUGA (_Delphinapterus leucas_, Pallas), like the
preceding species, is a native of the Polar seas, where it is common;
it is abundant in the White and Kara Seas, and in the Gulf of Obi;
on the coast of Norway it is occasionally met with. From Scotland,
five individuals have been recorded, but it must be regarded as only
an accidental straggler. On the east coast of America it is found as
far south as the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where, as in the White Sea, it
delights in ascending the mouths of large rivers.
No English examples have been met with, but, in the British Association
Report on the Fauna of Devonshire (1869, pp. 84 and 85) occurs the
following passage. “Mr. H. P. Gosse writes:--‘On August 5th, 1832, I
was returning from Newfoundland to England, and was sailing up the
British Channel close to the land, when, just off Berry Head, I saw
under the ship’s bows a large cetacean of a milky white hue, but
appearing slightly tinged with green from the intervening stratum
of clear water. It was about 16 feet long, with a round bluff head.
It continued to swim along before the vessel’s head, a few yards
beneath the surface, for about ten minutes, maintaining our rate of
speed, which was five knots an hour, all which time I enjoyed from the
bow-sprit a very good view of it. It could have been no other than the
White Whale, the _B. borealis_ of Lesson.’” Mr. Alston also states that
Mr. J. G. Gordon informed him that in June, 1878, “he saw a large white
cetacean, presumably of this species, in Loch Etive.”
[Illustration: Fig. 22. BELUGA, caught by the tail, near Dunrobin,
Sutherlandshire.]
In a communication to the Zoological Society of London,[40] quoting
a letter from the Rev. Dr. Joass, of Golspie, Professor Flower thus
describes the singular capture of one of these rare visitants to our
seas:--“It was found close to the salmon-nets, near the Little Ferry,
about three miles to the westward of Dunrobin, Sutherlandshire, at ebb
tide, on Monday, June 9th, 1879, caught by the tail between two short
posts, to which a stake-net was fastened; and a salmon, of 18 lbs.
weight, which was supposed to have been the object of its pursuit,
was found in front of it. It measured 12 ft. 6 in. in length. The
tail was 34 inches across, and the flippers 17 inches long. It was a
female [adult] and had twenty teeth in the upper jaw, and sixteen in
the lower. the stomach contained a few flakes of fish, which, from
their size and colour, might have been salmon.... I have heard since,
that two days before its capture, it was seen off Cracaig by Brora
fishermen, who were lying at their lines. At first they thought it was
a human body; as it approached, _against the ebb_, they took it for
a ghost!” On examining the skull of this specimen, Professor Flower
discovered that, at some previous period of the animal’s existence,
the atlas had been completely dislocated, “the whole of the surfaces,
formerly in apposition, being now free from each other,” an injury to
an aquatic animal as difficult to account for as it is to imagine the
possibility of its surviving, but affording a remarkable instance of
the creature’s recuperative power.
The Whales exhibited at the Westminster Aquarium, in September, 1877,
and again in May, 1878, belonged to this species; unfortunately they
did not live to equal in docility and intelligence a specimen exhibited
in America, which “learned to recognize his keeper, and would allow
himself to be handled by him, and at the proper time would come and
put his head out of the water to receive the harness” by which he was
attached to a car in which he drew a young lady round the tank,--or
to take his food. A specimen of _Delphinus tursio_, which was for a
time with him in the same tank, is said to have been even more docile
than this remarkable animal.[41] The adult Beluga is pure white, and a
“school” of these animals “leaping and playing in the calm, dark sea,”
is said to be a very beautiful sight. In summer the Greenlanders kill
great numbers, extracting the oil and drying the flesh for winter use;
in Russia, the prepared skin is much used for reins or other parts of
harness requiring great strength and lightness; in this country, too,
under the name of porpoise-hide, it is now extensively used, and the
salted skins sell for from 3s. 6d. to 4s. 6d. per lb. The whale-ship,
“Arctic,” of Dundee, brought home 600 skins from Davis Strait, in the
season of 1880. The length of the full-grown animal is about 16 ft.,
and its food consists of fishes, Crustacea, and Cephalapods.
[Illustration: Fig. 23. THE GRAMPUS (_Orca gladiator_, Lacép.)]
THE GRAMPUS, OR KILLER.
The common GRAMPUS, or KILLER (_Orca gladiator_, Lacépède), (fig. 23)
is a well-known and widely-dispersed species, being found in both the
North Atlantic and Pacific Seas. Andrew Murray says “the common Grampus
tumbles through the heavy waves all the way from Britain to Japan,
_viâ_ the North-west Passage.” In the British seas it is frequently met
with, and has occurred in several instances on the coast of Norfolk.
This species is very fierce, its appetite insatiable, and carnivorous
in the strictest sense of the word; to the Greenland and White Whale,
as well as to Porpoises and Seals, it is an implacable enemy, and
follows them ruthlessly. Dr. Brown says, “the White Whale and Seals
often run ashore, in terror of this cetacean, and I have seen Seals
spring out of the water when pursued by it. The whalers hate to see it,
for its arrival is the signal for every Whale to leave that portion of
the ice.” Eschricht took out of the stomach of a Killer, 21 ft. long,
which came ashore in Jutland, no less than thirteen common porpoises
and fourteen Seals.
The rounded, compact form of this species gives the idea of great
strength and swiftness, and the beautifully-polished glossy black skin
of the back contrasting with the equally pure and well-defined white
of the lower parts has a very striking effect; over the eye there is
a well-defined white spot. It is a very handsome species, but there is
something in its appearance which seems to indicate its cruel nature.
Thirteen or fourteen strong, slightly curved teeth are found on either
side of both jaws; the flippers are broad and oval-shaped, the dorsal
fin high and falcate, particularly in the male.
[Illustration: Fig. 24. _Pseudorca crassidens_ (Owen).]
As my object is mainly that of assisting in the identification of
casual visitants to our shores, rather than of giving anything like a
history of the known British species of Cetacea, it may be desirable
to mention here a very remarkable form, which, although it has never
been known to occur in the flesh on our shores, was first made known
to science from an imperfect skeleton found in a semi-fossil condition
beneath the peat in a Lincolnshire Fen. To this Dolphin, “come back,
as it were, from the dead,” and which forms a connecting link between
the genus _Orca_ and the genera _Grampus_ and _Globicephalus_ (and
which Owen had named _Phocœna crassidens_), Reinhardt gives the name of
_Pseudorca crassidens_. On the 24th November, 1861, a large shoal of
these dolphins made their appearance in the Bay of Kiel. The sailors
succeeded in separating about thirty of them from the remainder, but
all, with one exception, escaped. This was a female 16 feet long,
which, after being exhibited at Kiel and other places, was bought for
the Museum of the University of Kiel. In the summer of 1862, three
other individuals, presumably from the same shoal, were thrown ashore
on the north-western coast of Zealand. Of the general appearance of
this creature the accompanying figure (24), copied, by kind permission,
from Professor Flower’s translation of Reinhardt’s paper,[42] published
by the Ray Society, will give an idea; the figure is from a photograph
of the Kiel specimen, and is not in the original paper. The length is
from 16 to 19 feet; of the colour no account is given, but, judging
from the woodcut of the Kiel specimen, it appears to be uniformly
shiny black. The number of teeth differs in individuals, but in this
one it was from 9 to 10 on either side of the lower jaw, and 8 to 10
in the upper. From the observations made by Reinhardt, he suggests
a possibility that there may be “a difference in the sizes of the
different sexes, and whether the females are not larger, but at the
same time, perhaps, provided with a head comparatively smaller than
that of the males.” It is very suggestive of how little we know of the
inhabitants of the sea, that at least one vast shoal of a species known
only from its sub-fossil remains should be roaming the seas only to be
accidentally discovered when its members became entangled in shallows
from which probably many never lived to extricate themselves.
RISSO’S GRAMPUS.
RISSO’S DOLPHIN (_Grampus griseus_, G. Cuvier; _Grampus cuvieri_, Gray,
Ann. Nat. Hist., 1846) is a rare and little-known species, which has
been met with four times on the south coast of England, and about
eight times in France. In the ‘Transactions’ of the Zoological Society,
for 1871, Professor Flower gives an account of an adult female which
was taken in a mackerel-net, near the Eddystone Lighthouse, on 28th
February, 1870, and which eventually was sent up to London. About a
month later, a second specimen was received in London, the precise
locality of which was not known, but it was probably from somewhere in
the Channel. This was also a female, but a very young animal, and as
the adult female first taken had recently given birth to a young one,
it is quite possible that it may have belonged to her. On the 26th
July, a male of the same species was captured alive at Sidlesham, near
Chichester, and sent to the Brighton Aquarium, where it lived for a few
hours only.
[Illustration: Fig. 25. RISSO’S DOLPHIN (_Grampus griseus_, G. Cuv.)]
Risso’s Dolphin varies very considerably in its colouration. The
Sidlesham specimen was bluish-black above, and dirty white beneath; in
the adult female described by Professor Flower (from whose illustration
our figure is, with his permission, copied), “the head and the whole
of the body anterior to the dorsal fin was of a lightish grey,
variegated with patches of both darker and whiter hue.... Behind the
anterior edge of the dorsal fin the general colour of the surface,
including the dorsal and caudal fins, was nearly black, though with
a large light patch on the upper part of the side directly above the
pudendal orifice. The middle of the belly as far back as the pudendal
orifice, was greyish white.”[43] The most remarkable characteristic,
however, was the presence, scattered over the body, of irregular light
streaks and spots; these markings extended from the head to within
about two feet from the tail; and presented a most singular appearance.
In the young one the upper parts and sides of the body were almost
black, and the lower parts nearly white, the junction between the two
colours being very abrupt and sharp. “On each side of the body were
six vertical whitish stripes nearly symmetrically arranged, and almost
equidistant, being about six inches apart. They did not extend quite
to the middle line of the body above, and were lost below in the light
colouring of the abdomen.”[44] The length of the Sidlesham male was 8
feet, that of the adult female 10 ft. 6 in.; in the former there were
present four teeth on each side the lower jaw, in the latter three
only on each side, and in the immature specimen there were present
seven teeth, four on the right, and three on the left side; the teeth
are always placed in the front part of the mandible, and in every
specimen examined there has been an entire absence of teeth in the
upper jaw. In general appearance, Risso’s Dolphin, more particularly
the dark-coloured specimens, is said very much to resemble the next
species (_Globicephalus melas_). Of its habits and distribution nothing
positive is known, but from its visiting France and England in the
spring or summer, M. Fischer concludes that this species “is migratory,
visiting the shores of Europe in the summer, and passing in winter
either to the south towards the coast of Africa, or to the west towards
the American Continent.”[45]
THE PILOT WHALE.
[Illustration: Fig. 26. PILOT WHALE (_Globicephalus melas_, Trail).]
The PILOT WHALE (_Globicephalus melas_, Trail; _Delphinus melas_,
Trail; _D. globiceps_, Cuv.; _D. deductor_, Scoresby), known in
Shetland as the Ca’ing or Driving Whale, is a frequent, although a very
uncertain, visitor in British waters. It is met with, according to
Lilljeborg, in the North Sea and northern part of the Atlantic Ocean,
occasionally as far north as Greenland; off the Orkney and Shetland
Islands, and on the North-west coast of Norway, it frequently makes
its appearance; and it has been found on the British coast as far
south as Cornwall. In Bell’s ‘British Quadrupeds’ it is said that it
also appears to enter the Mediterranean. This species is pre-eminently
gregarious, and generally occurs in large herds, often numbering
several hundreds. So strong is their habit of association that they
follow the leading Whale like a flock of sheep, a habit of which the
Orkney and Shetland Islanders are fully aware, and avail themselves to
the full. When a herd appears in one of the bays, boats immediately
put off, and if possible, get to seaward of them, then gradually
approaching, with shouts and splashes, they urge the whole herd
shoreward, and are generally successful in driving a large number of
Whales into shallow water; but should the leader break through the line
of boats, the probability is that no efforts the boats’ crews can make
will prevent all its companions following. Bell gives many instances of
large numbers of these animals being taken, the last of which, quoted
from the ‘Zoologist’ for 1846, is, perhaps, the most extraordinary. It
is there stated, “on newspaper authority,” that 2,080 were taken in
Faroe in the previous year within six weeks, and that 1,540 were killed
_within two hours_ in Quendall Bay, Shetland, on the 22nd September,
1845.
As it too frequently happens that the unfortunate cetaceans which fall
into the hands of the fishermen are simply hacked to pieces, and die
only from exhaustion arising from loss of blood, it is worthy of remark
that, according to Herr Collett, of Christiania, in Norway they are
readily killed by a rifle shot, in the throat, or under the breast.
This species (fig. 26) is remarkable for its peculiarly rounded
head,--hence its generic name; the flippers are long and pointed, the
dorsal fin long and low; the teeth are about an inch in length, seldom
all present in the adults, and the normal number, according to Bell,
about twenty-four on either side each jaw; ten to twelve is, however,
the more usual number present. The length of the adult is about
nineteen or twenty feet, its colour glossy black, with the exception of
a white stripe along the belly, which has a heart-shaped termination
under the throat. Its favourite food is said to be cuttlefish. The
figure is copied, with permission, from the ‘Transactions’ of the
Zoological Society, vol. viii., pl. 30.
PORPOISE.
The COMMON PORPOISE (_Phocœna communis_, F. Cuv.; _Delphinus phocœna_,
Linn.) is the best known of the Cetacea inhabiting the North Sea, being
met with in abundance all round the British Isles, seldom occurring
far from land, and often ascending large rivers for a considerable
distance: it has been seen in the Thames as high as London Bridge.
Nothing can be more interesting than to watch a shoal of these animals
at sea, sometimes tumbling and gambolling under the bows of the vessel
which is passing rapidly through the water, with as much ease as if
she were motionless, or chasing each other playfully round and round
the ship as she lies becalmed, their white bellies glistening in the
clear sea, and frequently, apparently out of pure mad delight, leaping
completely out of the water, returning to their native element with a
most determined header. But it is not till seen in the glass-sided tank
of the aquarium that the beauty, and even poetry of motion of these
animals can be fully appreciated; swimming along in a series of gentle
curves, they just bring the blow-hole to the surface, breathe without
stopping, and continue the curve, till in due course they reach the
surface again. This is repeated for the whole length of their spacious
tank, or is varied by unexpected eccentricities, all indescribably
graceful. Under these favourable circumstances for observation it is
also clearly seen that the horizontal tail is the propeller which gives
the motion; the alternate upward and downward pressure of this organ
against the water evidently producing the graceful mode of progression
which is so difficult to describe, but so easily understood when
witnessed. The flippers are not used as propellers. When the animal
is moving forwards they are laid back, against the body; but when it
wishes to stop, they are stretched out at right angles to it, so as
to offer a resistance to the water, and so arrest the onward motion of
the animal. All this, although perfectly understood in theory before,
strikes the beholder as a new and beautiful sight when first viewed in
practice, from a stand-point, on a level with the animal itself, and as
it were in its own element.
The food of the Porpoise consists of fish, and it follows the shoals
of herrings, &c., amongst which it commits great depredations; it has
a taste for salmon, and is sometimes taken in the salmon-nets. The
period of gestation is said to be six months, and it brings forth one
young one at a birth; its colour is black on the back, shaded off
to silver-grey on the belly, the whole skin beautifully smooth and
polished. The teeth number about twenty-five on each side of either
jaw, and are spatulate, with a contracted neck, unlike the usually
conical teeth of the _Delphinidæ_. The length is four or five feet.
The flesh of the Porpoise seems formerly to have been esteemed as an
article of food, and is mentioned several times in the L’Estrange
Household Book (1519 to 1578) and other similar records; it is said by
one who has eaten it to be “excellent meat, dark in colour, and large
in fibre, but of excellent flavour, very tender, and full of gravy.”
THE COMMON DOLPHIN.
The COMMON DOLPHIN (_Delphinus delphis_, Linn.), fig. 27, is not
unfrequently met with in the seas surrounding the southern portion
of the British Isles; but from the northern division of the kingdom,
although it, doubtless, occasionally visits Scottish waters, there is
no reliable record of its occurrence. This species, probably, often
passes unrecognized. It may, however, be at once distinguished from
the Porpoise by its attenuated beak, the head of the Porpoise being
obtuse, and the beak altogether absent. It is a native of the temperate
seas, and becomes scarcer as the north is approached. Van Beneden was
not able to record it as frequenting the Belgian coast, but Lilljeborg
says it is occasionally obtained on the coasts of Scandinavia, and Herr
Collett has hardly any doubt that it occurs on the Norwegian coast
as far north as Finmarken, and a large “school,” seen by Malmgren
in April, 1861, in West-fjord, between the Loffoden Islands and the
mainland, was referred by him, without hesitation, to this species.
In Greenland it is said to be met with, but Professor Flower thinks
it doubtful whether some species of an allied genus may not have been
mistaken for it.
[Illustration: Fig. 27. COMMON DOLPHIN (_Delphinus delphis_, Linn.).]
This is the true Dolphin of the Ancients, of which Professor Bell,
in his ‘British Quadrupeds,’ says: “the mythological and poetical
associations which belong to the Dolphin, its reputed attachment to
mankind, its benevolent aid in cases of shipwreck, its dedication to
the gods, and many other attributes expressive of the high estimation
in which it was held in olden times, afford a striking example of
how the unrestrained imagination of the ancients could raise the most
gorgeous structures of poetry and religion upon the most slender
basis.... It requires some stretch of the imagination to identify
the round-headed creature which is represented in ancient coins
and statues, with the straight sharp-beaked animal,” which is here
figured. It is sad to destroy at one fell swoop all the romance which
once surrounded this species; but Dr. Gray tells us that “the dying
Dolphin’s changing hues” are not observed in a cetacean at all, but in
a fish of the genus _Coryphæna_, which, although normally black, is
stated by Mr. Couch (as quoted by Mr. Yarrell) to have changed to a
fine blue whilst he was making a drawing of it. The food of the Dolphin
consists of fish, cuttlefish, and crustaceans, and on the Cornish
coast it makes its appearance in considerable numbers, according to
Mr. Couch, in the month of September during the pilchard season. It is
very social in its habits, and even more sportive in the water than its
relative, the Porpoise. The illustration is copied from Reinhardt’s
figure.
Professor Flower thus describes a specimen taken in March, 1879,
Mevagessey: “Instead of being simply black above and white below, as
usually described, the sides were shaded, mottled, and streaked with
various tints of yellow and grey, ... the under surface was of the
purest possible white; perfect symmetry was shown in the colouring and
markings on the two sides of the body.”[46] There is, probably, much
variation in the disposal of the colour; in a beautiful drawing, in my
possession, made by Mr. Gatcombe from a specimen taken at Plymouth, the
colour is so disposed as to show two graceful waving lines, crossing
each other about the centre of the animal’s body, forming a figure
somewhat like an elongated figure eight. The dental formulæ vary from
40/40 40/40 to 50/50 50/50, the numbers not always being equal, even on
the different sides of the mouth of the same individual. The length is
from 5 to 8 feet.
BOTTLE-NOSED DOLPHIN.
The BOTTLE-NOSED DOLPHIN (_Delphinus tursio_, Fab.; _Tursio truncatus_,
Gray), fig. 28, appears to be found occasionally from the Mediterranean
to the North Sea; it is by no means, however, a common species.
Professor Flower says it “is rare in the Mediterranean, though Gervais
gives several instances of its capture in the Gulf of Lyons. It
probably has a more northern range than _D. delphis_; but, as in the
case of that species, there is still much obscurity as to the exact
limits of its distribution.”[47] A specimen was seen in January, 1873,
in the fish-market at Algiers, by Mr. J. W. Clark, of Cambridge.
[Illustration: Fig. 28. BOTTLE-NOSED DOLPHIN (_Delphinus tursio_,
Fabricius.)]
Of the habits of this species very little is known: its colour is black
above, shaded to white below, and its length from 8 to 12 feet; teeth
from 21 to 25 on either side of each jaw, truncated when old. The
figure is from a drawing of a nearly adult male, taken at Holyhead, in
October, 1868, for which I am indebted to the kindness of Professor
Flower.
WHITE-SIDED DOLPHIN.
The WHITE-SIDED DOLPHIN (_Delphinus acutus_, J. E. Gray;
_Lagenorhynchus acutus_, Gray, Zool. Erebus and Terror), is a rare
species, which has occurred in a few instances on the British coast;
it is said, however, by Dr. A. R. Duguid, often to be seen about the
Orkney Islands, but rarely secured. Its colour is black above and white
below, between which runs a broad band of yellowish brown, about the
centre of which, and surrounded by it, is a large oblong patch of pure
white. The adult measures from 6 to 8 feet in length. A figure and
description, by Dr. Duguid, taken from one of a herd of twenty landed
at Kirkwall, on the 21st August, 1858, will be found in the ‘Ann. and
Mag. of Nat. Hist.’ (3rd series) for August, 1864, vol. xiv., p. 133.
WHITE-BEAKED DOLPHIN.
The last species on the British list, the WHITE-BEAKED DOLPHIN
(_Delphinus albirostris_, J. E. Gray; _Lagenorhynchus albirostris_, J.
E. Gray, Zool. Erebus and Terror), is also of rare occurrence: it is a
native of the North Atlantic, has occurred at the Faroe Islands, and
on the coasts of Norway and Sweden, and Denmark, also at Ostend, but
little is known of its habits. A Dolphin of this species was killed at
Hartlepool in 1834, but not recognized at the time: the skull is now
in the Cambridge Museum. This species was, I believe, first described
as British by Mr. Brightwell, under the name of _D. tursio_, from a
specimen taken off Yarmouth, in 1846. His paper, with a figure from a
drawing made by Miss Brightwell, will be found in the ‘Ann. and Mag.
of Nat. Hist.,’ first series, January, 1846, vol. xvii, p. 21. Another
specimen was shot by Mr. H. M. Upcher, near Cromer, and will be found
recorded by Dr. Gray in the same Magazine, for April, 1866, vol. xvii.,
p. 312. A fourth, an adult male, 9 feet long, was taken at the mouth of
the Dee, in December, 1862; and a fifth on the south coast, in 1871.
[Illustration: Fig. 29. WHITE-BEAKED DOLPHIN (_Delphinus albirostris_,
J. E. Gray).]
In September, 1875, a young female was taken off Grimsby, and in March,
1876, a young male was captured off Lowestoft. The first-named of
these latter formed the subject of a communication to the Zoological
Society of London, by Dr. Cunningham, of Edinburgh, and the latter of a
subsequent notice, by Mr. J. W. Clark, of Cambridge. Both papers will
be found printed in the ‘Proceedings’ of the Zoological Society for
1876, p. 679, _et seq._, and figures of the two specimens are given on
the same plate. On the 24th August, 1879, a young female, the skull of
which is now in the Norfolk and Norwich Museum, was landed at Yarmouth,
and on the 22nd March, 1880, another young female was also landed
at the same place, the exact locality in which it was taken being
uncertain. On the 7th September, 1880, a young male, the first recorded
Scotch specimen, was taken on the east coast, near the Bell Rock, thus
realising the belief, expressed shortly before (‘Mammalia of Scotland,’
_Nat. Hist. Soc. of Glasgow_, 1880, p. 23) by Mr. Alston, that it might
be expected to occur in Scottish waters. The total length was 5 ft. 8
in.
Through the kindness of Mr. Clark, I am enabled to give a figure of
the Lowestoft specimen. Mr. Clark’s figure differs considerably from
Dr. Cunningham’s, both in outline and in the disposal of colour, being
much more slender, and showing considerably less white; both, however,
differ still more from Mr. Brightwell’s figure than they do from each
other. A good figure of the adult animal is still a desideratum, that
by Miss Brightwell being obviously incorrect. Mr. Clark’s specimen was
glossy black on the upper part, and creamy white on the under; the
upper lip white, with a black spot at the tip, and a few irregular
pale grey cloudings on its surface; the coloration exceedingly
beautiful, and such as no drawing could give an adequate idea of. The
two last-named Yarmouth examples agreed very closely in all respects
with Mr. Clark’s description. Mr. Brightwell’s specimen had the whole
upper part and sides rich purple-black, the lips, throat, and belly
cream-colour, varied by chalky-white. This specimen, an adult, measured
8 ft. 2 in. in length, Mr. Clark’s 5 ft. 5½ in., and Dr. Cunningham’s
4 ft. 2 in. Two others, also both young ones, measured respectively 4
ft. 3 in., and 5 ft. The teeth vary in number, but are about twenty-six
on either side each jaw; in one specimen, carefully examined by the
writer, they were 26/24 26/24, several of the front teeth not having
pierced the gum.
In addition to those enumerated above, others are said to have occurred
on the coast of Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and to have been seen
off the Faroe Islands. It is singular that 5 of the 10 recorded British
specimens should have been landed on the Norfolk coast.
This species concludes the short list of the twenty-two British
Cetacea, of which I have endeavoured to give a popular, but I hope, at
the same time, so far as it is at present known, a reliable account;
my principal object, as I stated in my introductory remarks, being to
induce those residing in suitable localities to take up the study of
this interesting family, and to assist in the identification of those
specimens which from time to time are cast upon our shores.
NOTE TO PAGE 77, RUDOLPHI’S RORQUAL (_Balænoptera laticeps_, J. E.
Gray).--Professor Flower, since the brief account of this animal at
p. 77 was printed, has called my attention to the undoubted priority
of Lesson’s name for this species, _Balænoptera borealis_, which was
founded upon Cuvier’s “Rorqual du Nord”; he also points out that Van
Beneden and Gervais follow Lesson in this respect, and says that in
future it is his intention to do the same. As it is most important
to establish an uniform nomenclature, I do not hesitate to follow
so distinguished an authority, and now wish to supply the omission
as far as it is possible to do so. The species will, doubtless,
henceforth be known as _Balænoptera borealis_, Lesson, Complément des
Œuvres de Buffon, Cetacés.
JARROLD AND SONS, PRINTERS, LONDON AND EXCHANGE STREETS, NORWICH.
Cloth, 6s.; or in Half Morocco, 10s. 6d.
OBSERVATIONS ON THE FAUNA OF NORFOLK,
AND MORE PARTICULARLY ON
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BY
THE LATE REV. RICHARD LUBBOCK, M.A.,
_Rector of Eccles_.
NEW EDITION,
WITH ADDITIONS FROM UNPUBLISHED MANUSCRIPTS OF THE AUTHOR, AND NOTES BY
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_Hon. Sec. to the Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists’ Society; Author of
“Seals & Whales of the British Seas_;”
ALSO A MEMOIR BY
HENRY STEVENSON, F.L.S.;
AND AN APPENDIX CONTAINING NOTES ON HAWKING IN NORFOLK BY
ALFRED NEWTON, M.A., F.R.S., &c.
AND ON THE DECOYS, REPTILES, SEA FISH, LEPIDOPTERA, AND BOTANY
OF THE COUNTY.
OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.
“Lubbock’s volume, written five-and-thirty years ago, has long been
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_desideratum_ with naturalists. A new edition has at length appeared,
edited by Mr. Thomas Southwell, of Norwich, who has made some
valuable additions of his own in the shape of notes on the existing
mammalia of Norfolk, and on decoys past and present in the county,
prefaced by a memoir of the author by Mr. Henry Stevenson, and
supplemented by some interesting notes on Hawking in Norfolk, from
the pen of Professor Newton.”--_The Field._
* * * * *
“In addition to the intrinsic merits of the book, of which we can
personally speak in the superlative degree as one of the most
pleasantly written of the many pleasant natural history books
our language is so rich in, describing, as it does, the ‘Broad
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* * * * *
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he includes the district known as Lothingland, between Lowestoft
and Yarmouth, which, though in Suffolk, belongs geographically to
Norfolk.”--_Midland Naturalist._
* * * * *
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from its perusal.”--_Zoologist._
* * * * *
“We can scarcely speak too highly of the way in which this volume
has been ‘got up,’ and the publishers have added such a map as has
never yet been executed of this county, showing, as it does, not only
the rivers and broads, and other principal pieces of water, but the
sites of heronries and decoys (used or disused), gulleries, and other
localities, having a special interest for Naturalists.”--_Norfolk
Chronicle._
* * * * *
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* * * * *
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FOOTNOTES
[1] Dr. Robert Brown on the ‘Seals of Greenland.’ Reprinted, with
additions, in the ‘Manual and Instructions for the Arctic Expedition,
1875,’ from the _Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1868, pp. 405-440.
[2] _Land and Water_, August 26th, 1875.
[3] Dr. Brown’s ‘Seals of Greenland,’ _Proc. Zool. Soc._, June, 1868,
reprinted in the ‘Arctic Manual,’ p. 67.
[4] ‘History of North American Pinnipeds,’ by Joel Asaph Allen. U.S.
Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories, Miscellaneous
Publications, No. 12, Washington Government Printing Office, 1880.
[5] ‘Seal and Herring Fisheries of Newfoundland,’ pp. 32-34, as quoted
by Allen, _l. c._, pp. 551-3.
[6] _Land and Water_, May 9th, 1874.
[7] Great diversity of opinion, however, exists upon this point, the
Dundee sealers considering that the fishery should open a few days
earlier, and that a time should be fixed for its closing, in order that
too great a number of the old Seals may not be shot. The young Seals
grow with great rapidity, and even a few hours make a marked difference
in their condition; it seems, therefore, of the greatest importance
that a time should be fixed for the opening of the fishery, which will
ensure the young animals being in as forward a condition as possible,
and that the nursing mother should be spared. It is said, also, that,
in consequence of the number of females killed while nursing, the old
dog Seals are vastly more numerous than the females, and that positive
good is accomplished by some of them being killed off. One opinion,
however, seems universal, which is, that not much good has resulted, at
present, from the close time.
[8] The Seal of the Caspian Sea was described as a variety of _Ph.
vitulina_, by Pallas, and as a distinct species, by Nilsson, under the
name of _Ph. caspica_. It is, however, notwithstanding its abundance,
very little known, and may, probably, prove to be more nearly allied to
the next species. The yearly average of this species taken in for the
six years ending 1872, as given by Schultz, is 130,000.
[9] _Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1868, p. 402.
[10] _Journal of Anatomy and Physiology_, 1870, p. 260.
[11] ‘Danish Greenland, its People and its Products,’ p. 123.
[12] ‘Mammalia of the Outer Hebrides,’ _Proc. Nat. Hist. Soc. Glasgow_,
1879, p. 95.
[13] _Ph. grœnlandica_ was the only Seal met with by the Austrian
Arctic Expedition, in the _Tegethoff_ in August, 1873, the ship then
drifting in the ice in lat. 79° 31′, long. 61° 43′. Subsequently both
this species and _Ph. barbata_ were met with about North lat. 81°.
[14] ‘Seals of Greenland.’ Reprinted in ‘_Manual and Instructions for
the Arctic Expedition_, 1875,’ p. 47.
[15] A communication in _Land and Water_ for Dec. 20, 1879, p. 524,
signed “R. M.,” states that about the 20th of June, 1879, a Walrus was
seen off the west coast of Skye. “He was seen lying on a rock near
the shore, on a fine calm evening, near enough to remove all doubt as
to the identity of the animal.... The huge tusks were quite easily
distinguished.” On being disturbed, it is said to have rolled into the
water, and swam a short distance to another rock, on which it was seen
to climb; after a little time it again took to the water, and was seen
no more. As no names are given, it is impossible to investigate this
report, or to judge what degree of importance should be attached to it.
[16] Cook’s Last Voyage, vol. ii. p. 458, edition 1784.
[17] ‘Some remarks on the Nat. Hist. of Franz Josef Land,’ by H. W.
Feilden, F.G.S., &c.--a Paper read before the Norfolk and Norwich
Naturalists’ Society, Dec. 28, 1880.
[18] _Physalus_, _Benedenia_, and _Sibbaldius_, of Gray, are now
rejected, I believe, by Prof. Flower.
[19] _Zoologist_, 1877, p. 360.
[20] McCulloch’s _Dictionary of Commerce_.
[21] Space will not permit of more than a passing reference here, but
much information as to the rise and progress of the whale-fishery
will be found in McCulloch’s ‘Dictionary of Commerce,’ article
“Whale-fishery;” Scammon’s ‘Marine Mammals of the North-western coast
of North America;’ Starbuck’s ‘History of the American Whale Fishery;’
Mr. C. R. Markham’s ‘The Threshold of the Unknown Region;’ Capt. A. H.
Markham’s book above referred to; and above all in Scoresby’s excellent
works, which have been extensively laid under contribution by nearly
all subsequent writers--‘An Account of the Arctic Regions, with a
History and Description of the Northern Whale-fishery’ (2 vols., 1820),
and ‘A Journal of a Voyage to the Northern Whale-fishery,’ in 1822.
[22] Blackstone mentions a curious old feudal law, to the effect “that
on the taking of a Whale on the coasts, which is a royal fish, it shall
be divided between the king and queen; the head only being the king’s
property, and the tail of it the queen’s. ‘_De Sturgione observetur,
quod rex illum habebit integrum: de balena vero sufficit, si rex habeat
caput, et regina caudam._’ The reason of this whimsical division, as
assigned by our ancient records, was, to furnish the Queen’s wardrobe
with whalebone”!--Blackstone’s ‘Commentaries,’ 1783 edit., vol. i., p.
223.
[23] Owen, ‘Anat. of Vert.,’ iii., pp. 546 and 553.
[24] Dr. Brown, in the paper before quoted, states that they couple
from June to August, and bring forth in March or April. See also a note
on ‘The Time and Manner of the Procreation of some Species of Whales,’
in the ‘Zoologist’ for 1845, p. 1161.
[25] ‘Recent Memoirs on the Cetacea, by Professors Eschricht, Reinhardt
and Lilljeborg,’ edited by Prof. Flower, Ray Society, 1866.
[26] ‘Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist.,’ 1878 (11), p. 495.
[27] ‘Bemærkninger til Norges Pattedyrfauna,’ p. 100. (Særskilt Afryk
af ‘Nyt Mag. for Naturvsk’) 1876.
[28] ‘Arctic Voyages of Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld,’ 1858-1879, pp. 51-2.
[29] ‘Geographical Distribution of Mammalia,’ by Andrew Murray, 1866,
p. 211.
[30] ‘Natural History of the Sperm Whale,’ p. 28.
[31] ‘Geographical Distribution of Mammalia,’ pp. 211-13.
[32] ‘Transactions’ of the Zoological Society, viii., p. 203.
[33] _Ibid._ x., p. 415.
[34] _Ibid._, p. 435.
[35] _Zoologist_, 1878, p. 319.
[36] Bell’s ‘Brit. Quad.’ p. 426.
[37] Collett, ‘Norges Pattedyrfauna,’ p. 99.
[38] ‘Zoology of H. M. S. Challenger,’ part iv., p. 29.
[39] _Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1871, pp. 41-53.
[40] _Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1879, pp. 667-9 (by which Society the above
woodcut was kindly lent).
[41] Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 3rd series, vol. 17, p. 312.
[42] Read before the Royal Danish Society of Sciences, in 1862.
[43] Trans. Zool. Soc., vol. viii, p. 3.
[44] _l. c._, p. 13.
[45] _l. c._, p. 18.
[46] _Trans. Zool. Soc._, vol. xi., p. 2, with plate.
[47] _Trans. Zool. Soc._, vol. xi., p. 5.
Transcriber note
Spelling and punctuation errors have been corrected.
Corrections listed in Errata have been applied to the text.
Italic text has been enclosed in underscores.
Bold text has been enclosed in equals.
Smallcap text has been capitalised.
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