The females being found generally in large numbers and in close company, it is difficult to fix the attention upon one individual, so as to ascertain precisely the time consumed below the surface. However, as all in one school generally rise at the same time, it may be observed that they remain below the water about twenty minutes. They make from thirty-five to forty expirations during the period they are at the surface, which is about five minutes, and they thus consume about a fifth of their time in respiration, a proportion considerably greater than that of the adult males. When disturbed or alarmed, this regularity in breathing appears to be no longer observed. For instance: when a “bull,” which, when undisturbed, remains at the surface until he has made fifty expirations, is alarmed by the approach of a boat, he immediately plunges beneath the surface, although he may not have performed more than half the usual number of his expirations. He will soon rise again not far distant and finish his full number of respirations; and in this case, also, he generally sinks without having assumed the perpendicular position before described. On the contrary, he sinks suddenly in the horizontal position, and with remarkable rapidity, leaving a sort of vortex in the place where his huge body lately floated. When urging his rapid course through the ocean in that mode of swimming which is called “going head out,” the spout is thrown out every time the head is raised above the surface, and under these circumstances of violent muscular exertion, as would be expected, the respiration is much more hurried than usual. [Illustration: HEAD OUT.] _Other Actions of the Sperm Whale_.—When in a state of alarm, or gamboling in sport on the surface of the ocean, the sperm whale has many curious modes of acting. It is difficult to conceive any object in nature calculated to cause alarm to this leviathan; notwithstanding which, he is remarkably timid, and is readily alarmed at the approach of a boat.