10 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



of Korea, they take every year a great number of 

 whales, in some of which are found harpoons {or 

 striking-irons) of the French and Dutch, who prac- 

 tise the whale-fishery at the extremities of Europe ; 

 whence we infer (he continues) that there is surely 

 a passage between Korea and Japan, which com- 

 municates to the Strait of Waigatz *," separating 

 Nova Zembla from the G)ntinent of Europe. 



Other circumstances can be adduced to the same 

 effect. The master of the Volunteer whaler of 

 Whitby, when near the coast of Spitzbergen, Ju- 

 ly 19. 1813, shewed me part of a lance which had 

 been taken out of the fat of a whale killed by his 

 crew a few weeks before. It was formed of a hard 

 grey stone, of a flinty appearance, about three inches 

 long, two broad, and two-tenths thick. Two holes 

 were pierced in one end of it, by which, it appeared 

 the stock or handle had been secured. It was com- 

 pletely embedded in the blubber, and the wound 

 was quite healed. A small white scar on the skin 

 of the whale, alone marked the place where the 

 lance had entered. In the year 1812, the crew of 

 a Hull fisher (the Aurora) met with a whale in the 

 same region having a harpoon made of bone, sticking 

 in its back ; and a few years ago a lance of stone, 

 somewhat like the one above mentioned, fixed to a 

 piece of bone, forming a socket for the stock, was like- 



Quarterly Review, No. xxxv. p. 217. 



