The manatee is very hard to kill; being timid, it darts away at the first alarm, and its swimming speed is exceedingly rapid if it is frightened; its thick skin, remarkably large, strong bones, and a thick layer of fat under its skin protect it in a great measure from injury by a bullet. The general method of securing the animal is to drive it into a very large, strong net. One side of the net is sunk to the river bottom, the other rises to the top of the water, and is then drawn about the hiding-place of the manatee. After a little training it will come when it is called, will eat from one’s hand, and likes to be petted and to have its head rubbed. FOOTNOTES: [76] The rhytina and dugong are not, as some suppose, manatees, but animals closely allied to true manatees. [77] When in captivity. LESSON XLIII. GREAT WHALES ALSO. “So far I live to Northward No man lives North of me; To the East are wild mountain chains, And beyond them meres and plains; To the Westward, all is sea.” --LONGFELLOW. Many people think that a whale is a huge fish, the largest of the fish class. This idea is entirely wrong; a whale is not a fish, but a mammal. It belongs to the same class as the cow, sheep, horse, lion, monkey, and man, because all these widely differing creatures are born alive, and not in an egg, and when young are nourished by their mothers’ milk. The mammalian class, distinguished in this way by suckling the young, is divided into many orders, and to one of these, the cetacean, or whale order, the whales give their name. The whale is the largest of all living mammals; it is a mammal of the sea, and has a fish-like body because its home is constantly in the waters. A whale is entirely helpless when cast upon the land; it is unable to move itself, or to find anything to eat. Out of water it will soon die, but not because it is unable to breathe air, as is the case with the fishes.[78] The whale breathes air through its nostrils into lungs; it does not have gills, and therefore while in the water it must constantly come to the surface for air. Thus the principal motion of the whale in the water is up and down, coming to the surface, and then seeking the depths. To aid it in this motion the whale’s tail expands sidewise or horizontally, and not up and down or vertically, as do the tails of most fishes which chiefly swim straight forward, or in large curves.