WHALE OILS. The whale or train (Germ., Thran) oil of commerce may be obtained from the blubber of any species of whale or dolphin (see Whale Fisheries, above). The only whale oil that is otherwise commercially distinguished is sperm or spermaceti oil, yielded by the sperm whales. Whale oil varies in colour from a bright honey yellow to a dark brown, according to the condition of the blubber from which it has been extracted. At best it has a rank fishy odour, and the darker the colour the more disagreeable the smell. Train oil consists of a glyceride of physetoleic acid (also found in earth-nut oil), together with stearin, palmitin, &c. With lowering of the temperature stearin, accompanied with a small proportion of spermaceti, separates from the oil, and a little under the freezing-point nearly the whole of these constituents may be crystallized out. When separated and pressed, this deposit is known as whale tallow, and the oil from which it is removed is distinguished as pressed whale oil; this, owing to its limpidity, is sometimes passed as sperm oil. Whale oil is principally used in oiling wools for combing, in batching flax and other vegetable fibres, in currying and chamois leather-making, and as a lubricant for machinery. Sperm oil is obtained from the enormous cavity in the head of the sperm whale, and from several smaller receptacles throughout the body of the animal. During the life of the whale the contents of these cavities are in a fluid condition, but no sooner is the “head matter” removed than the solid wax spermaceti separates in white crystalline flakes, leaving the oil a clear yellow fluid having a fishy odour. The oil, which has an acid reaction, is purified by treatment with a solution of potash, which precipitates impurities held by the acid of ...