The cachalot is from 40 to 60 feet long, about equaling the Greenland
bowhead whale in size. It has a huge blunt head, which comprises about
one-third of the entire animal. The mouth is large and the under jaw is
provided with a row of heavy teeth, consisting of ivory finer in grain
than that from an elephant’s tusk.
The great whaling industry of the last two centuries was based mainly
on the sperm and the bowhead whales. The largest of the bowheads is
limited to the cold northern waters, but the sperm whale frequents
the tropic and subtropic seas around the globe. The main hunting area
for them lies in the South Pacific, but they frequently visit more
temperate coasts, especially when seeking sheltered bays, where their
young may be born. The young are suckled and guarded carefully until
old enough to be left to their own devices. Sperm whales sometimes
occur off both coasts of the United States, especially off southern
California.
The feeding grounds of these whales are mainly in the deepest parts
of the ocean, where they cruise about in irregular schools containing
a number of individuals. Their food consists almost entirely of large
octopuses and giant squids, which are swallowed in large sections.
As befits a gigantic mammal possessing huge jaws armed with rows of
fighting teeth, the sperm whale is a much more pugnacious animal than
the bowhead. There are many records of whale-boats being smashed by
them, and several well-authenticated cases of enraged bull cachalots
having charged and crushed in the sides of whaling ships, causing them
speedily to founder.
The sperm whale yields oil of a better quality than the bowhead. Its
huge head always contains a considerable number of barrels of specially
fine-grade oil, which produces the spermaceti of commerce. Ambergris,
having an excessively high value for use in the manufacture of certain
perfumes, is a product occasionally formed in the digestive tract of
the sperm whale.
The name cachalot is one to conjure with. It brings up visions of
three-year voyages to the famed South Seas, palm-bedecked coral
islands, and idyllic days with dusky islanders. As in the case of the
Greenland bowhead, however, this animal has been hunted until only a
small fraction of its former numbers survives and the romantic days of
its pursuit are gone, never to return.