New Zealand, California, Japan, the Cape, the Bay of Biscay, and in fact almost every shore or sea from pole to pole, has some whale called by its name; for these gaping fishers are everywhere, and it is not always easy to say whether the same whale is not called by different names in various parts of the world. In the shallow bays and lagoons they may be found with their newly-born young ones very early in the year; while far out at sea ships meet with them travelling in shoals, or “schools,” northwards, as the summer sets in and the Arctic Sea is swarming with life. In fact the Californian gray whales go right up into the ice, poking their noses up through the holes to breathe, and then they travel far away south again into the tropics to bring up their young ones. And whether large or small, toothed whales or whalebone whales, active as the dolphin and the huge fin-whales or rorquals, which dash through the water although some are nearly a hundred feet long, or lazy and harmless as the Greenland whale is unless attacked, in one thing all the whale family betray their high place in the animal kingdom. Nowhere, either on land or in the water, can mothers be found more tender, more devoted, or more willing to sacrifice their lives for their children than whale-mothers. Scoresby tells us that the whalers, as means of catching the grown-up whales, will sometimes strike a young one with harpoon and line, sure that the mother will come to its rescue. Then she may be seen coming to the top with it encouraging it to swim away, and she will even take it under her fin, and, in spite of the harpoons of the whalers, will never leave it till life is extinct. Nay, she has been known to carry it off triumphantly, for the lash of her tail is furiously strong when she is maddened by the danger of her child, so that a boat’s crew scarcely dare approach her. And now there remains the question what enemies besides man these strong-swimming milk-givers can have in their ocean home? We have seen that the orca or killer whale will turn cannibal and devour those of its own kind, and the swordfish is said to attack whales with its formidable spear; but these are not their greatest enemies. With many of the whales it is tiny creatures like those on which they feed which hasten their death, for small parasitic crustaceans cover their head and fins, and feed upon their fat, so that whales which have been infested with these animals are often found to be “dry,” or to have lost nearly all their oil. And thus we see the tables turned, and while the whale feeds upon minute creatures, it is in its turn destroyed by them.