090 A. E. Verrill — The Bermuda Islands. 



taken recently, though that may be because only the particularly 

 large ones were then thought worthy of record. 



Mayor Hay ward, of St. George's, tells me that he remembers that 

 when a child he was permitted to stand on the back of one that had 

 been captured and brought inshore, which was 80 feet long and 

 was said to have been the largest ever taken here. Mr. Hayward, 

 of St. David's Island, probably refers to the same one, in the notes 

 sent to me by his daughter, for he says that in 1*39 they took a 

 sperm whale yielding 84 barrels of oil, which was regarded as the 

 largest one ever taken here. It was struck by Josiah Smith. 



At that period Hayward's whale oil establishment at St. David's 

 Island was one of the largest. A local paper, in 1^32, in noticing 

 the capture of a sperm whale, mentions that it was the seventh whale 

 taken that season for the Hayward's. At that time about twelve 

 boats were engaged in the pursuit of whales, — chiefly sperm whales, 

 it appears. 



Mr. Hurdis, in recording the capture of a half-grown sperm whale 

 in 1840, remarks that it was the first one of the kind that had been 

 captured in nine years. This is inconsistent with Mr. Hayward's 

 statement of the capture of the large one in 1839, and of the record 

 of seven in 1832. But at that time the communication between St. 

 David's and Hamilton was not very easy nor rapid, so that Mr. 

 Hurdis may have known very little about the captures of these 

 whales. He records another, in July, 1851, as a rare capture. 



Matthew Jones records the capture of one 47 feet long, in May, 

 1863 ; and of another 40 feet long, taken 14 miles south of David's 

 Head, June 19, 1869. 



Very few have been taken in recent years, the fishery having been 

 nearly abandoned. I saw a small one, about 30 feet long, captured 

 in April, 1901. It was regarded as a curiosity, even by the natives, 

 and was kept several days for exhibition, under a tent, where it 

 attracted crowds of visitors. 



This whale has certainly become comparatively rare in the Atlantic 

 Ocean, as well as in all other regions, during the past sixt^r years. 



31. — The Extermination of Breeding Sea Turtles ; the Lizard. 



a. — Former Abundance of Sea Turtles. 



Mr. Henry May and his company, 1593, and the companions of 

 Sir George Somers, in 1609, found the sea-turtles breeding in large 

 numbers on the sandy shores of the Bermudas, and those ship- 



