Like the last one, this animal was pursuing a school of sardines and proved easy to approach. Andersen fired at about fifteen fathoms, getting fast but not killing at once, and a second harpoon was sent crashing into the beautiful gray body which before many hours would fill several hundred cans and be sold in the markets at Osaka. The sharks again gathered about the ship when the whale was raised to the surface, but this time none was harpooned as we were anxious to start for the station. It was nearly three o’clock when the ship was on her course and fully six before we caught a glimpse of the summit of Kinka-San, still twenty miles away. A light fog had begun to gather, and in the west filmy clouds draped themselves in a mantle of red and gold about the sun. Ere the first stars appeared, the wind freshened again and the clouds had gathered into puffy balls edged with black, which scudded across the sky and settled into a leaden mass on the horizon. It was evident that the good weather had ended and that we were going to run inside just in time to escape a storm. CHAPTER IX HABITS OF THE SEI WHALE [Illustration: “For many years the sei whale was supposed to be the young of either the blue or the finback whale, and it was not until 1828 that it was recognized by science as being a distinct species.” ] For many years the sei whale was supposed to be the young of either the blue or the finback whale, and it was not until 1828 that it was recognized by science as being a distinct species. The Norwegians gave the animal its name because it arrives upon the coast of Finmark with the “_seje_,” or black codfish (_Polachius virens_), but in Japan it is called iwashi kujira (_sardine whale_). [Illustration: A sei whale fast to the ship. The shape of the spout is well shown. ] Until shore stations were erected in various parts of the world sei whales were supposed to be very rare and were known only from the North Atlantic Ocean, but within the last fifteen years they have been taken near South Africa, the Falkland and South Shetland Islands, and Japan, and have proved to be one of the most abundant of large cetaceans. The sei whale has a roving disposition and wanders restlessly from one coast to another, sometimes journeying great distances and suddenly appearing in waters where it has never before been known. It has more or less regular migrations and there is evidence that individuals travel from the Antarctic into the North Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.