Page:Journal of a Voyage to Greenland, in the Year 1821.djvu/95

Rh bustle took place, and boats were sent in pursuit, from one of which, by some mismanagement, the harpooner made an ineffectual throw, which frightened away the whales, and they were seen no more. In the return of one of the boats, a unicorn, or narwal was killed, and brought to the ship: it measured fourteen feet in length, and the horn four feet two inches.



The head of the narwal is about one-fourth the length of the body, round, small, and terminating in an obtuse nose; mouth small; no teeth; eyes small and nearly oval; external opening of the ear a minute orifice. The orifices for respiration in the back part of the head duplicated within, and with a structure exquisitely formed, have the appearance of human lips; back broad, convex, and tapering towards the tail, which is horizontal; the pectoral fins small, and bending inwards; colour generally cinereous, dappled with numerous black spots; belly shining white, and soft as velvet. It does not yield much blubber, which is only three inches and a half in thickness; between the blubber and the muscles, is a range of tendons along the back, some of them as small as the finest thread. The narwal is a native of the northern seas, where it is sometimes