The Durham daily globe. (Durham, N.C.) 1889-1894, 1893-07-17

IT. Curious .!outIl. Strange. lame. -.
III

/ teeth but once. and that j. when il is
born" said New Yorker who was for.
/ IncrIv q whalcr hose teeth are milk
teeth. and when the young whale is
! }Ycaned they do not fail out like
babys milk teeth, bat disappear by alb,
~orption in the jaw and instead of be
] ing replaced by permInl at teeth, plates
Of baIeen, or whalebone. are substitute
eel for them.
In the seas whore the Greenland
whale resorts the great octopods that
| form the food of the cOchelot whale
can not exist, and the only inhabitants
| Of those waters on which the whale can
| feed are Of very small size. the largest
! of them not exceeding an inch in length.
/ The cOchclOt whale would starve tc
death even in the midst Of the myriads
of the animalculB that swim in the
| Arctic seas. for it's narrow lower jaw
| and great teeth, set wide apart in it,
/ would he useless in the capture
Of such small prey. Great mum.
bers Of those marine midgets must
| necessarily be taken to nOurish sc
| enormous a creature as the Greenland
| whale, and consequently the structure
Of the head must be modified as far as
| concerns the portions of it which are
| used in procuring of food. The skull is
! exceedingly narrow and elongated and
| the cavity of the mouth enormous. The
| two halves Of the lower jaw, instead OF
being closely pressed against each other,
| as in the whale that has teeth, are
bowed sharply outward, and the roof OF
the mouth is arched like the interior OF
large dome. Thus the space neces.
sary to take in an enormous quantity
Of the little ANIMALS is provided, and tc
inclose the prey within it the curious
| formation which is commonly known
| as WhalebOne is brought into play,
| This WhalebOne issues from the upper
jaw in q series of long, horny plates
| called blades or flakes by WhalerS. The
| flakes are short at the angle of the jaw
| and at the end of it, and long in the
middle. | have seen these central
flakes twelve feet long, and whales
have been taken with flakes sixteen
feet long, more than foot
wide and two inches thick on
the back. These flakes are
shaped like the blade of a knife, grow
ING thinner as they recede from the
jaw, the edge of the blades being
turned inward, only their backs being
| visible on the outside. This whale.
bone is not bone at all, but, like the
horn of the rhinoccrOs, is simply an az,
,grcgatiOn Of hair, and if it be boiled
for sometime and then pounded with
| malIct, it will become regular tuft OF
bristIes. In its natural state the thin
| edge Of each flake, as well as the tip, is
| naturally bolIen up into it's component
hairs. 50 that it forms a bristly fringe
around the edges Of the mouth. There
are two hundred and fifty blades on
each side Of the upper jaw, and they
are set 50 closely side by side that
visiting card could with difficulty be
| inserted between them. Thus the
| en0ImOC, cavity Of the mouth is en-
| closed within a vast triangular case of
| baleen, the loose fibers of the interior
| forming perfect hair sieve. This liv
| ing sieve is of such gigantic dimen-
sions that whalebOat fully manned
| might be rOwed into it without touch
ing the sides of the mouth.
"People generally know baleen only
| in its commercial state, and have nc
idea what it is like in its live or natu-
raj state. 1t is then soft, flexible and
elastic, and entirely unlike the brittle
| articles seen in the stores. A piece OF
| dried whalcbOne, if bent, will break at
| the point of tension and there is no
| elasticity to 1T. But during the life Of
the whale buleen is absolutely unbreak-
able. 1t is veritabe India rubber.
When the mouth of the whale is closed
the baleen blades bend backward into
deep grooves, but as soon as the great
sea mammoth opens its mouth they
spring forward by their own wonderful
elasticity. so that they entirely close
the space between the upper and lower
Jaws. and the bushels Of little mOllusl1s
that the whale gathers in as he skins
them from the surface into his enOr-
nous mouth are held imprisoned within
the great hinged Enclosure, only the
water escaping through the hairy sieve.
The Greenland whale is constantly
on the move, and a rapid move it is, too.
| \ speed Of twenty knots an hour through
the water. scOOping up his dainty sub
siStencc. is nothing for one of these
greedy leviathans of the deep. The
most curious part Of this constant,
rapid jOurneying of the Greenland
whale if that it never slows up any to
feed its young. which live by sucking
the mother until the baleen begins to
appear in their upper jaws. Taking its
food and at the same time travelling at
railroad speed would be an impossible
ity with the cub whale if it depended
on Ieisurely style of sucking, such as
young pigs and other mammals do.
But nature has built the Greenland
whale on different plan. The whale
mother is constructed so that she can
give her cub it's meal instantly, al
though it requires not less than gal
lon of milk to satisfy a whale cubs APP
petite. The teat of the female whale
is a regular force pump, and when the
young whale, speeding along at its
mothers side through the waters, gives
notice that it is hungry, and seizes the
tactical fount. the mother sets the force
pump in motion. and the whole supply
Of milk needed by the cub is injected