74 HISTORY AND METHODS OF THE FISHERIES. 



account by Captain Roys of the opening up of this profitable whaling region: "I entered the 

 Arctic Ocean about the middle of July, and cruised from continent to continent, going as high as 

 latitude 70, and saw whales wherever I went, cutting in my last whale on the 23d of August, and 

 returning, through Bering Strait, on the 28th of the same month. On account of powerful currents, 

 thick fogs, the near vicinity of land and ice, combined with the imperfection of charts and want 

 of information respecting this region, I found it both difficult and dangerous to get oil, although 

 there were plenty of whales. Hereafter, doubtless, many ships will go there, and I think there 

 ought to be some provision made to save the lives of those who go there should they be cast 

 away." * 



The whales taken by Captain Roys were of the bowhead species, which is peculiar to Arctic 

 regions. Vessels had been taking the right whale in the Okhotsk Sea and neighboring waters for 

 some years prior to the inauguration of the Bering Strait fishery, but it was not until about this 

 time that whalemen began to take notice of the bowhead or Greenland whale that had been looked 

 upon as of no more importance than the finback Or sulphur-bottom whales. They were greatly 

 surprised when they discovered with what ease the bowhead could be killed, and the great amount 

 of oil and bone it yielded. According to Starbnck, the first bowheads were taken in the year 1843 

 on the coast of Kamchatka by ships Hercules, Captain Ricketson, and Janus, Captain Turner, 

 both of New Bedford. This species of whale was first taken in the Okhotsk Sea about 1847, or, as 

 Captain Roys thiuks, in 1848 or 1849.t 



CAPTAIN BARNES ON ARCTIC WHALING IN 1877. The following account of Arctic whaling 

 during the season of 1877 is kindly furnished by Capt. William M. Barnes, of bark Sea Breeze, of 

 New Bedford. The letter was written to Capt. H. W. Seabury, and published in the New Bedford 

 Evening Standard of November 21, 1877. 



"We came yesterday (October 22) through the Aleutian Islands by the 172 west longitude 

 pass. Better charts and a greater familiarity with these islands than we formerly possessed have 

 deprived them of much of the dread we formerly entertained for them, and I do not think that 

 any vessel has lately taken the old route on the down passage to the west of the islands. In going 

 .north last spring we passed the chain at the same place on May 4, and three days later came up 

 to ice in latitude 56 30' north. From that time till the 23d of the same month we skirted the ice 

 to westward, attempting in different places to penetrate it, but ever finding it too compact. On 

 May 24 we were in sight of land, 250 miles west-southwest from Cape Navarin, and on that day we 

 entered the ice in company with barks Roman and Mount Wollastou. In a week we had worked 

 through a belt of ice of some 40 miles in width, and had come into a strip of clear water, inshore 

 of the ice, and extending all the way to Cape Navarin. It was the luck of the Sea Breeze to get 

 into this water a few hours ahead of the other two vessels, and with a good breeze we soon were 

 a long way from them, but before they lost sight of us whales had made their appearance in the 

 loose ice around their ships, and each vessel succeeded in taking two large ones. 



"On the 6th of June we were off Cape Navarin, and on the 10th off Plover Bay, not having 

 seen a single whale. On the following day, off Cape Chaplin, we saw and chased a whale going 

 quick north, and on the same day spoke Captain Redfield, of a trading schooner, who reported the 

 eastern part of the sea quite free from ice, and that he had seen quite a number of whales off St. 

 Lawrence Island. So we, going by our experience in these last few years, supposed that the 

 whales had already gone to the north, and made the best of our way into the Arctic. It proved, 

 however, that there was still a large body of whalers somewhere in the southern ice that came up 

 through the straits after nearly all the whales had passed through. The several trading vessels 



" Whale and his Captors, p. 105. tSee Scammnn's Marine Mammalia, p. GO, ami Niinrod of the Sea, p. 388. 



