the surface of the sea, and sustaining that almost inconceivable pressure of the superincumbent water. On one occasion which fell under Mr. Scoresby’s own observation a whale was struck from a boat. The animal instantly descended, dragging down with him a rope nearly _one mile long_. Having let out this much of the rope, the situation of the boat’s crew became critical. Either they must have cut the line, and submitted to a very serious loss, or have run the risk of being dragged under water by the whale. The men were desired to retire to the stern, to counterbalance the pulls of the whale, which dragged the bow down sometimes to within an inch of the water. In this dangerous dilemma the boat remained some time, vibrating up and down with the tugs of the monster, but never moving from the place where it lay when the harpoon was first thrown. This fact proves that the whale must have descended at once perpendicularly, as had he advanced in any direction he must have pulled the boat along with him. Mr. Scoresby and the crew were rescued by the timely arrival of another boat furnished with fresh ropes and harpoons. A whale when struck will dive sometimes to a depth of 800 fathoms; and as the surface of a large animal may be estimated at 1,500 square feet, at this depth it will have to sustain a pressure equal to 211,000 tons. The transition from that which it is exposed to at the surface, and which may be taken at about 1,300 tons, to so enormous an increase, must be productive of the utmost exhaustion. Strange incidents are related of harpooning. On September 24th, 1864, as the _Alexander_, belonging to Dundee, was steaming about in Davis’s Straits, a whale of about twelve tons was observed not far distant from her. Boats were put out, and the crew secured the animal. When they cleansed it, they found embedded in its body, two or three inches beneath the skin, a piece of a harpoon about eighteen inches long; on the one side were engraved the words—“_Traveller_,” _Peterhead_, and on the other, “1838.” This vessel was lost in 1856, in the Cumberland Straits whale‐ fishery; it is therefore clear that the harpoon must have remained in the animal from that time.