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Updated: June 1, 2025
The creature has qualities that we should hardly expect. It has been tamed and almost domesticated. The enterprising Barnum exhibited in New York a beluga which drew a boat about in his aquarium. At Boston another beluga from the St. Lawrence drew about a floating car carrying a woman performer.
The light sail was set, and soon we were bounding away in the direction of Mille Vaches, Captain Sam at the oar that constituted the helm, and Captain Sol in the bow, with harpoon at hand, ready for the appearance of game. The white whale, or Beluga, is extremely common at the mouth of the St. Lawrence, and is found a considerable distance up the river beyond Tadousac.
The beluga was afterward killed at the mouth of the Mackenzie River, it having towed the body considerably more than one thousand miles. For clothing, deerskins were stretched and scraped with flint instruments, then dressed with powdered heavy-spar, making the skin soft and pliable.
The porpoise hide of the boot maker is really leather, made from the skin of the BELUGA, or "white whale," which is found only in the far north. The cover was removed from the "tryworks" amidships, revealing two gigantic pots set in a frame of brickwork side by side, capable of holding 200 gallons each. Such a cooking apparatus as might have graced a Brobdingnagian kitchen.
Before the universal sway of petroleum it was much used for lighting purposes; an ordinary lamp would burn for 72 hours without going out. The Abbé Casgrain says that a barrel of the oil is worth from 100 to 200 dollars and since each beluga would yield not less than a barrel the value of the fishery in a good season is evident. The skin is very thick and of extraordinary strength.
As the boat reached mid-stream, where the wind was blowing against the current, great rollers were met with, that tossed the light craft about like a ball. But this was evidently the play-ground of the Beluga, and dead ahead the white forms were seen darting about in the inky water with startling distinctness, while faint puffs were occasionally borne down on the wind.
And numerous they sometimes are; 500 have been taken in a single tide; at Rivière Ouelle, about 1870, 101 were killed in one night by only four men. They had not expected such a host and had no time to send for help before the tide should rise again. The captors are armed with barbed harpoons and with spears. The harpoon is sometimes thrown at the beluga from a considerable distance.
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