Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/450

 430 RORQUAL ROSA vary in width from ^ in. to 3 in., and allow of the distention necessary to hold the water containing its prey, which is strained through the baleen during the shutting of the mouth ; the tongue is free at the apex. The rorqual attains a length of 100 to 110 ft.; the body is compressed on the sides and angular on the back ; the head comparatively small, and the tail narrower than in the right whale ; the lower jaw is longer and much wider than the upper; there is a small dorsal opposite the vent; the pectorals are distant from the an- gle of the mouth, slender, straight, and point- ed. The color is dark bluish gray, lighter be- low, the lower lip and the folds rosy white. They blow so violently as to be heard a great distance in calm weather; when seen, they are almost always in motion, and when about to descend do not throw the tail high in the air. They are abundant in the arctic seas, especially on the coast of Spitzbergen, as far as lat. 80 N. in open summer weather; they generally avoid much ice, and are shunned by the right whale, and their appearance is con- sequently unfavorable to the whalemen's suc- cess. The usual rate of swimming is about 12 m. an hour ; they are bold, but not revenge- ful or mischievous, though like other whales they will often attack and destroy a boat when their mates or young are wounded. The Greenlanders sometimes take small specimens by following in their canoes, and throwing so many lances that the animal dies from loss of blood; they are also occasionally stranded in their pursuit of herring and other fish into shallow water on a retreating tide. In a skel- eton 78 ft. long, the head was 21 ft., and the vertebral column 57 ft. ; there were 7 cervicals and 13 dorsals, the longest rib (the 6th) 11 ft. long; the bodies of the larger vertebrae were 14 in. in diameter, and G to 7 ft. from tip to tip of the transverse processes; the skull in some parts had a vertical thickness of more than 3 ft. In a female 95 ft. long, the head was 22 ft. and the lower jaw 25 ft. long, and the weight of the skeleton 35 tons. This, with the Mediterranean rorqual (mentioned below) and other species, Gray places in a distinct genus physalus, though without very satisfactory ge- neric characters. The lesser rorqual, consid- ered by Bell as the young of the greater, was made into a separate species by Dr. Knox with the specific name of minor, and is the B. ros- trata (Gray). It attains a length of 25 ft., and has 15 fewer vertebrae than the preceding spe- cies ; the baleen is short and white, the folds of the throat rosy, and the upper part of the base of the pectoral is marked with a white spot. It frequents the rocky bays of Green- land and the coasts of Norway and Iceland, sometimes descending to lower latitudes; it feeds on the arctic salmon and other fish ; it is very active and rarely attacked, though its flesh is highly estimated in northern climates ; the oil is also very delicate, and forms an im- portant article of Icelandic materia medica. The rorqual of the southern seas, or black whale of the South Pacific (B. australis, Guv.), has a long dorsal immediately over the pec- torals; it is black above, white beneath, and the folds roseous ; the vertebrae are 52 in all. It rarely approaches the cape coasts, and from its strength, velocity, and small yield of oil is not considered worth pursuing; it attains a length of 40 ft. ; it can leap entirely out of water, and is fond of floating perpendicularly, with only the head above the surface. The rorqual of the Mediterranean (B. antiquorum, Fisch.) is probably the one called mysticetus by Aristotle, and miuculug by Pliny. Some of this species have been stranded on the south- ern coasts of France, 60 to 80 ft. in length ; the color is grayish black above, lower jaw and folds rosy, rest of lower parts white. Two specimens of rorqual have been obtained with- in a few years on the New England coasts, and the skeleton of one 50 ft. long is in the collec- tion of the Boston society of natural history. Other species are described. Some small spe- cies have been found fossil in the pliocene of Piedmont, far from and high above the present level of the sea. M. Cortesi discovered two species, named by Desmoulins B. Cuvieri and B. Cortetii, respectively 21 and 12 ft. long. ROSA, Kuphrosyoe Parepa, an English soprano singer, born in Edinburgh in 1836, died in London, Jan. 21, 1874. Her father was Geor- giades de Boyescu, a Wallachian nobleman; her mother was Elizabeth Seguin. The latter, left a widow at the age of 21, adopted music as a profession, and trained her daughter for it. She studied under Crescentini, Panseron, and Bordogni, and made her debut at Malta in 1855 as Amina in La sonnambula, adopt- ing the stage name of Parepa. After sing- ing in many cities of southern Europe, in 1867 she went to London, where she made her first appearance in / Puritani. In 1868 she with- drew from the stage and married Oapt. Car- veil, a retired officer of the East India ser- vice, who died in 1865. Having lost all her property by an unfortunate investment, she returned to the profession, and joined a con- cert company which Mr. H. L. Bateman was organizing for the United States. Her first appearance in this country at Irving hall, New York, in September, 1865, was exceedingly suc- cessful. She returned with the same manager in 1866-'7, and in the course of the season married the violinist Carl Rosa. In New York, Boston, and other American cities she sang frequently in oratorio, winning probably in this class of music her most enduring fame. She appeared also from time to time in Italian opera. In 1869 she and her husband organ- ized an English opera company, with which during three winters they made tours of the principal American cities, producing for the first time in America Weber's "Oberon," and reviving Mozart's " Marriage of Figaro." Du- ring the winter of 1872-'3 she was a member of the Italian opera company at the khedive's