Evening in the North 307 



South Georgia with fourteen chasers which produced 103,000 casks 

 of oil. Three companies in the South Shetlands with eight chasers 

 killed 1560 whales to produce 32,500 casks, while still another 

 Chileno-Norwegian firm obtained 8000 casks from an additional 400 

 whales in that area. Stations at Valdivia and San Pedro in Chile, 

 others at Durban and Saldana in the Union of South Africa, more 

 in Mozambique, and still others in Brazil and Australia swelled the 

 vast total. 



This new "southern fishery" developed at an astonishing rate be- 

 tween 1906 and 191 1, while the northern declined — the same story 

 as that of the right-whale fishery. While the total of oil from the 

 south rose from 4200 barrels to no fewer than 306,000 during tliis 

 period, that from the north dropped from a peak of 69,000 in 1908 

 to 38,000 in 191 1 and continued downward thereafter. Since only 

 six barrels represent a long ton, more than 57,330 tons of whale oil 

 were harvested in the last year of this decade. In this peak year also, 

 something entirely new was added — a development in the long evo- 

 lution of "tools," in the sense that we discussed them earlier — the 

 exact origin of which is, for once, known. This was the first floating 

 factory ship. 



Actually, two such ships sailed that year, but to widely separated 

 areas. The first went to the southern fishery and was based on Ker- 

 guelen Island in the southern Indian Ocean; the second left its home 

 port months later, since it only had to make the short passage to the 

 Spitsbergen grounds; and both were immediate successes. What is 

 more, they solved a number of problems that had frustrated the mod- 

 ern whalers for twenty years. Their full activities rightly belong in 

 the second period of Norwegian enterprise, and they will be dis- 

 cussed in detail in the next chapter. Suffice it to point out here that 

 they obviated the necessity for shore stations; they saved vast 

 amounts of time and fuel going to and from whaling grounds on 

 the part of the chasers; and finally they offered provision for ren- 

 dering the whole whale, instead of the blubber alone, on the high 

 seas. 



From this date onwards, the Norwegian industry entered the 

 fourth decade of its first phase, and this, as we have noted above, 

 was one of rapid change-over from shore-based operations to the 

 full-fledged oceanic operation of today. The first two factory ships 



