From The Belly Of A Whale

I’ve been reading this book, Leviathon: The History Of Whaling In America, which for the most part covers the history of whaling as a business in early America but also includes some far-fetched whale tales of Biblical proportions. Like the story of one James Bartley of the ship Star Of The East. Debbie Downipedia says the story is an urban legend but its a great story. Bartley’s crew take a boat out to kill a sperm whale, the same type of whale we saw in New Zealand.

The tail of sperm whale is described in the book as having “a hardness almost of iron with elasticity greater than steel; and urged by a thousand horse-power”. So the angry whale easily smashed Bartley’s boat to splinters. He disappeared and the survivors of the crew continued to pursue the whale, eventually killing it. As they carved it up, they discovered Bartley inside, Jonah-style, unconscious but still alive, his skin bleached white by the gastric juices of the whale’s stomach. Good stuff. It also reminded me of a great great song in the genre of modern pirate music by the Decemberists.

Michael and I had talked about this whale before and whether whales have teeth. Many have baleen (or “whalebone”) that filters krill and other small creatures out of the water. But the sperm whale has a row of up to 50 teeth along its bottom jaw, each up to 10″ long and 2lbs. They can grow up to 70ft long so perhaps it is possible for a human to slip between its teeth as the song says. Its doubtful though that the throat of the sperm whale is large enough to swallow a whole person.