266 W'H.W ES AND DOLPHINS 



Verde Islands. England entered into the industry in 1785, and 

 it was an English ship which first sailed round the Horn into 

 the Pacific in pursuit of the whales. Soon all the great oceans 

 were being searched, and the animals were being pursued 

 literally from China to Peru. The industry reached its 

 maximum development in 1837, and before the middle of the 

 nineteenth century had begun to decline. 



For the ten years 1830-40, 41,241,310 gallons of sperm oil 

 had been secured by American ships ; for the decade 1870-80 

 the figure was reduced to 12,819,493, and. after 1884, the old 

 method of sperm whaling became extinct. The reduction 

 and final disappearance of the fishery was partly due to the 

 extended use of mineral oil as an illuminant in place of sperm 

 oil, but the decline had commenced before the petroleum 

 industry was inaugurated in 1859, so that the decrease reflected 

 a real reduction in the stock of available Sperm Whales. As 

 Sir Sidney Harmer points out, "The naturalist may well feel 

 that he owes much to petroleum ", because but for its intro- 

 duction into the market the Sperm Whale in the nineteenth 

 century might have been hunted to a point much nearer 

 extinction. 



At the present time this whale is again being hunted, but 

 now, instead of being pursued by half a dozen men in a rowing 

 boat and using hand harpoons, steam whale catchers with 

 harpoon guns greatly reduce the hazards of the chase. In the 

 whaling period covering the southern summer 1934-35 and 

 the northern summer 1935, 2238 Sperm Whales were taken 

 from the following regions : South Georgia and the Antarctic 

 Continent, 577 ; coast of Natal, 595 ; Japan and Korea, 479 ; 

 British Columbia, 175 ; Chile, 173 ; the Azores, 136 ; with 

 lesser numbers for the Faroe Islands, Norway, Newfoundland, 

 Alaska and Mexico. Attention may be drawn to the rapid 

 increase in the number of Sperm Whales taken in the Antarctic 

 between 1919-35. From 1919-20 up to and including the 

 season 1931-32 the Sperm catch was always less than 100 

 in any one season ; in 1932-33 it reached 107 ; in 1933-34, 

 666; and in 1934-35, 577. These figures, together with those 

 preceding them, have been extracted from the 'Norsk 

 Hvalfangst-Tidende ' for August, 1936. Apart from any 

 consideration concerning the effect of this increasing slaughter 



