Once, when sixty miles at sea off the Japanese coast, trouble with the engines caused the ship to lie to for about three hours. During most of that time I was in the barrel at the masthead watching with glasses a school of porpoises (_Lagenorhynchus obliquidens_), which were playing about some distance from the ship. As far as I could see there was not the slightest sign of a whale nor had there been for at least two hours. Suddenly, not more than two hundred fathoms in front of the ship, four humpbacks spouted and began to feed. They remained for almost half an hour in our immediate vicinity, wallowing about at the surface, and then, as at a signal, arched their backs, drew out their flukes, and sounded. They rose again about half a mile away, spouted a few times and disappeared. There is not one chance in ten that those whales could have blown within five miles of the ship, when they first appeared, without being seen. The ocean was as calm as a millpond and the sun so brilliant that the spouts glittered like a cloud of silver dust thrown into the air. From the masthead I could see for miles and had, moreover, been watching the water in every direction as the porpoises circled and played about the ship. Practically the same thing has been reported to me at various times from other localities. Captain Grahame said that in Alaska at a certain place in Frederick Sound a school of finbacks used to appear suddenly every day about four o’clock in the afternoon. The whalemen seemed to be of the opinion that the animals had been under the water for some hours, perhaps sleeping on the bottom. From what is known of the physiology of cetaceans this is highly improbable if not actually impossible. To me the most reasonable explanation seems to be the one advanced by Rocovitza, viz., that some species of whales frequently swim long distances at considerable speed without appearing to blow. When there is little feed and the whales are constantly moving, or traveling, I have seen them rise a mile or more from the place where they last disappeared, spout a few times and again go down, repeating this as long as they could be seen from the ship. There is no valid reason why the animals should not continue for half an hour or more without appearing to blow and during that time even slow swimmers, such as humpbacks, could cover three or four miles. One day at Ulsan, Korea, Captain Hurum found two humpbacks and struck one. Captain Melsom who was but a short distance away came up at once and stood by to shoot the second whale. But that individual had absolutely disappeared and although the sea was calm and both ships kept a sharp watch was never seen again. Captain Melsom says it must certainly have swum five miles without rising to spout.