What do we do with baleen? It so combines lightness, elasticity, and
flexibility, that nothing yet invented adapts itself so perfectly to all
the requirements of the fashionable corset. Whalebone whips are made
from single pieces of baleen seven or eight feet long. A whalebone
horsewhip costs from fifteen to eighteen dollars and will outlast a
dozen cheaper persuaders. The Sairy Gamp umbrella of the last
generation, which boasted whalebone ribs, never "broke its mighty heart"
in a rainstorm (and incidentally could never be shut up tight). Flexible
steel has taken the place of whalebone in many of the arts; but new
avenues of usefulness open up to baleen. Out of it artificial feathers
of exquisite lightness and wigs or toupees are made. Shredded into fine
filaments, baleen is now woven in with the other fibres in the
manufacture of the finest French silks, imparting resilience and
elasticity to the rich material. A Chicago paper of the date of this
writing advertises:
WHALEBONE TEETH $5
A GREAT DISCOVERY
THE NEW WHALEBONE PLATE WHICH IS THE LIGHTEST
AND STRONGEST SET KNOWN
DOES NOT COVER THE ROOF OF THE MOUTH
Guaranteed ten years
YOU BITE CORN OFF THE COB
Spermaceti, the solid waxy body carried round in the Cachalot's head in
solution, is a valuable whale-product.
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