96 A History of the American Whale Fishery. 
secured in the required form until cold. The prepara- 
tion of the bone consists of boiling it in hot water for 
several hours, which makes it soft when hot and harder 
when cold. The surface is then cleaned and polished, 
while the jet black color, usually seen, is the result of a 
dyeing process.* 
Though now so precious, it was only a century ago that 
the bone was often dumped over the ship’s side as so 
much waste or was saved by the sailors only for making 
curious knick-knacks during their leisure hours. As 
late: as 1830 bone had only just reached a price of over 
twenty cents per pound, but as its value was recognized 
and the demand increased the price rose steadily and 
has continued to do so up to the present time. 
Whalebone appears to have found its first use in 
women’s stays, and later in parasols and umbrellas, in all 
of which uses it was subsequently largely replaced by 
steel. At various times it has been used by milliners, in 
upholstery, as the framework for trunks and traveling 
bags, in fishing rods, driving whips, shafts, springs and 
wheels of carriages, etc., while the coarse hair on the 
bone has often been used as a substitute for curled hair in 
upholstering furniture. Various substitutes, either nat- 
ural or artificial, have largely supplanted the other 
whale products, and in some degree bone has been re- 
placed by steel, celluloid, rattan, etc., but no material has 
been found which will answer all its purposes. It is for- 
tunate that this is so, for without the demand for whale- 
bone the whale fishery would almost certainly disappear. 
The consumption of whalebone at present, both in this 
country and in Europe, is confined largely to the original 
use—in corsets and in stays for dresses. 
Ambergris, the only other product of the whale fishery, 
i 
§3 Scoresby, p. 435. 
54 Simmonds, p. 389. 
55 Pease, p. 32. 
56 Scoresby, p. 436. 
ee 
