the water are extremely beautiful, and their skin is very smooth and slippery. Every species of Whale propagates only with those of its kind, and does not at all mingle with the rest; they are, however, generally seen in shoals, of different kinds together, and make their migrations in large companies from one ocean to another.

The fidelity and fondness of the male and female to each other are extreme. The female produces one young one at a birth, after a gestation of nine or ten months. When she suckles it, she throws herself on one side, on the surface of the water, and it continues with her for twelve months, during which she protects it with the utmost assiduity and courage.

The manner in which the Whale feeds is by swimming rapidly beneath the surface of the sea, with its jaws widely extended. The marine animals enter with the water, and are retained by the whalebone, while the water escapes at the sides.

Whales are chiefly taken in the northern seas. The English send out with every ship six or seven boats, each of which has one harpooner, one man at the rudder, one manager of the line, and four seamen to row. In each boat there are also two or three harpoons, several lances, and six lines, each one hundred and twenty fathoms long, fastened together.

As soon as the Whale is struck with the harpoon he darts into the deep, carrying the instrument off in his body; and so rapid is its motion, that if the line were to entangle, it would either snap like a thread, or overset the boat: one man therefore is stationed to attend only to the line, that it may go regularly out, and another is also employed in continually wetting the place it runs against, that the wood may not take fire from the friction. On the Whale's return to breathe, the harpooner inflicts a fresh wound, till at length, fainting from loss of blood, the men venture the boat quite up to him, and a long steeled lance is

thrust into his breast and other parts, which soon puts an end to his existence.

When the carcass begins to float, holes are cut in the fins and tail, and ropes being fastened into these, he is towed to the ship, where he is fastened along the larboard side, floating with his back on the water.

In order to take out the blubber and whalebone, several men now get upon the animal with iron calkers or spurs, to prevent their slipping, and separate the tail, which is hoisted on deck. They then cut out square pieces of blubber, weighing two or three thousand pounds each, which by means of the capstan, are also hoisted up. These are cut into smaller pieces, which are thrown into the hold, and left for three or four days to drain. When all the blubber is cut from the belly of the fish, it is turned on one side, by means of a piece of blubber left in the middle, called the cant, or turning piece. They then cut out this side in large pieces as before, and also the whalebone, with the gums, which are preserved entire, and hoisted on deck, where the blades are cut and separated, and left till the men have time to scrape and clean them. The Whale is next turned with its back upwards, and the blubber cut out from the back and crown bone: the whole is concluded by cutting the blubber from the other side. Before, however, the remainder of the body is left to float away, they cut out the two large upper jawbones, which are hoisted on deck, cleansed, and fastened to the shrouds, and tubs are placed under them to receive the oil which they discharge; which oil belongs to the captain.

In three or four days they hoist the pieces of blubber out of the hold, chop and put them by small pieces through the bung-holes into the casks.

A Whale, the longest blade of whose mouth measures nine or ten feet, will yield about thirty butts of blubber; but some of the largest will yield upwards of seventy. One of the latter is generally worth about

one thousand pounds sterling; and a full ship of about three hundred tons burthen, will produce more than five thousand pounds from one voyage.

The Whale-fishery begins in May, and continues through the months of June and July: but whether the ships have had good or bad success, they must come away and get clear of the ice by the end of August: so that in the month of September, at furthest, they may be expected home; but the more fortunate ships often return in June or July.

THOUGH the Sword Fish belongs to a quite different tribe from the whale, yet the inveterate hostility which the former bears to the latter has induced us to bring them both under one point of view. There are two species, which differ from each other only in a very trifling degree; the one is the BROAD-FINNED, the other the EUROPEAN SWORD FISH. The second is the subject of the engraving. It is a very large, powerful, and voracious animal, growing to the length of upwards of twenty feet. The body is of a conical form, black on the back and white under the belly. The mouth is large and toothless, and the tail remarkably forked. The most curious peculiarity of the fish is its long, pointed, sword-like upper jaw, which is of a substance like a coarse kind of ivory. This

fish has sometimes been found on the British coasts, and is very common in the Mediterranean. The Sicilians consider its flesh as being equal to that of the sturgeon.

The Sword Fish possesses a wonderful degree of strength. The Leopard man of war was struck by one of them on her return from a cruise. Though the blow was given while the animal was following the ship, and consequently with less force than if it had been given in an opposite direction, the sword passed through one inch of sheathing, three inches of plank, and buried itself four inches and a half in the timber; nearly a quarter of a yard in the whole. The sword was broken off by the shock. To drive an iron pin the same depth into wood would require eight or nine strokes from a hammer of a quarter of a hundred weight; yet the fish drove in his weapon at a single stroke. In the British Museum there is also a plank of a vessel which a fish pierced with the whole length of his sword, though he lost his life by the effort.

Whenever a Sword Fish meets a whale, he instantly assails him. Sometimes two of these animals will join in the attack. The whale has no other means of defence than his tail, the tremendous blow of which the Sword Fish, in general, avoids, and then buries his weapon in his adversary. It is in vain that the whale dives, for he is still pursued by his tormentor, and he is at length compelled to avail himself of his superior swiftness, and to leave the Sword Fish master of the field. As the wounds which he receives cannot penetrate beyond the blubber, they are not productive of much injury to him.

Both species of the Sword Fish are insatiably voracious, and will attack and destroy every living thing that comes within their reach. The formidable manner in which they are armed gives them great advantages over almost all the rest of the finny race.

VOL. II.

K

THOUGH SO often incorrectly painted as being of the shape of the letter S, the Dolphin is almost straight, the back being very slightly incurvated, and the body slender; the nose is long, narrow, and pointed, with a broad transverse band, or projection of the skin on its upper part. The mouth is very wide, and has twenty-one teeth in the upper, and nineteen in the lower jaw, somewhat above an inch long, conic at the upper end, sharp pointed, and bending a little in. They are placed at a small distance from each other; so that when the mouth is shut, the teeth of both jaws lock into each other; the spout-hole is placed in the middle of the head; the tail is semilunar; the skin is smooth; the colour of the back and sides dusky; the belly whitish; it swims with great swiftness, and its prey is fish, but particularly cod, herrings, and flat fish. The Dolphin is longer and more slender than the porpus, measuring nine or ten feet in length, and two in diameter.

All this species have fins on the back; very large heads; and resemble each other in their appetites, their manners, and conformation, being equally voracious, active, and roving. No fish could escape them, but from the awkward position of their mouth, which is placed in a manner under the head; and their own agility is so great as to prevent them from being often