There is another whale, found in the northern regions, called the razor-backed whale, from a prominent ridge on its back. It is found 100 feet long. As it is constantly moving along at the rate of five miles an hour, and is very powerful and active, frequently breaking away and carrying lines and gear with it, only the most daring whalers, in default of other prey, venture to attack it. There is a third sort of whale, called the broad-nosed whale, which is in many respects like a razor-back, but smaller--its length being from 50 to 80 feet. The smallest sort is the beaked whale, which is about 25 feet long. Great numbers of this whale are often caught in the deep bays and firths of Shetland and Orkney. I must now give an account of the spermaceti whale, (the _Physeter macrocephalus_), to capture which was the object of our voyage. It is found through every part of the South Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, and frequently makes its way to far northern latitudes. Still the southern seas must be considered its chief abode. In appearance and habits it is very different from the black whale. It is nearly as long as the razor-back, and exceeds it in bulk. In length it may be said to be from 80 to 85 feet, and from 30 to 35 in circumference. Looking at a sperm whale, the stem on its nose or snout appears very thick, and perfectly blunt, like a huge mallet about to strike. The head is a third part of the length of the body. At its junction with the body a hump rises, which we whalers call the _bunch of the neck_. Behind this is the thickest part of the body, which tapers off till there is another rise which we call the hump, in the shape of a pyramid--then commences the _small_, as we call it, or tail, with a ridge partly down it. The "small" gradually tapers till it contracts very much; and at the end the flukes, or what landsmen would call the tail, is joined on. In the immense head is contained the case, which is a cavity of almost triangular shape, and of great size, containing, when the whale is alive, that oily substance or fluid called spermaceti. I have frequently seen a ton taken from the case of one whale, which is fully ten large barrels. The use to the whale of the spermaceti in its head is, that, being much lighter than water, it can rise with great facility to the surface, and elevate its blow-hole above it. Its mouth is of great size, extending all the length of its head, or, as I have said, a third of its whole length. Its jaws narrow forward to almost a point-- indeed, the lower one does so; and thus, as it swims along, like the stem of a ship, it serves to divide the water wedge, parting to make way for its huge body--the blunt snout being all the time like the lofty forecastle of an old-fashioned ship, clear of the waves high up above it. The inside of the monstrous cavity, the mouth, has nothing like the baleen or whale-bone, such as is found in the Greenland whale; but in