HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN WHALE FISHERY. 109 



On the receipt of tlie news of this disaster, more i)articularl,y in ISTew 

 Bedford, ^reat excitement was occasioned. The value of the wrecked 

 vessels sailing from that port alone exceeded, with their car<^oes, one 

 million of dollars. But the owners of whalinj?- vessels were not the men 

 to yield supinely to a single misfortune, however overpowering it might 

 seem, and the ensuing year twenty-seven ships were busy in the Arctic, 

 and in 1873 twenty-nine visited that precarious sea. 



Still whaling in general continued to decline. Tlie sun of its destiny 

 was moving toward its western horizon. Whether some modern Joshua 

 shall command it to stand still, or whether it shall move still nearer its 

 full setting, is yet uncertain. Some oil will still be used until its i)erfect 

 substitute is produced at so low a rate that the expenses of whaling 

 will entirely absorb its protits. 



On the 1st of January, 1877, the entire fleet was reduced to 112 ships 

 and barks, and 51 brigs and schooners, having a total capacity of 

 37,828 tons * 



Before closing this chapter it would be well to see to what causes this 

 decline is attributable. Many circumstances have operated to bring this 

 about. The alternate stimulus and rebuff which the fishery received as 

 a short supply and good prices led to additions to the fleet and an over- 

 stock and decline in values, were natural, and in themselves probably 



following year, and wrote home the couditioa of such of tlie vessels as still remained. 

 The Minerva lay at the entrance to Wainwright Inlet, as good in hull as when aban- 

 doned. The T. Dickason lay on her beam-ends on the bank, bilged and full of water 

 The Seneca was dragged by the ice up the coast some distance ; her bowsprit was gone 

 bulwarks stove, and rudder carried away, and she was frozen in solid. The Reindeer 

 sank, and the Florida was ashore on Sea-Horse Islands, burned to the water'a edge. 

 The rest of the fleet were either carried away by the ice, crushed to pieces, or burned 

 by the natives. The Gay Head and Concordia were burned where they lay. " The 

 bark Massachusetts went around Point Barrow. There was one white man on board 

 her who staid up here last winter. He made his escape over the ice this summer, and 

 was five days getting back to the ships. He was aboi^t used up when they fotmd him 

 this summer. The natives set out to kill him, but the women saved him, and after- 

 ward the old chief took care of him. He saved a large quantity of bone, but the na- 

 tives took it away from him, except a small quantity. He said $1.50,000 would not 

 tempt him to try another winter in the Arctic. He said that four days after we left 

 the ships last year the water froze over and the natives walked off to the ships ; and 

 fourteeu days after there came on a heavy northeast gale and drove all but the gronnd- 

 ice away, (that never moved.) Shortly after there blew another northeast gale, and 

 he said that of all the butting and smashing he ever saw, the worst was among those 

 ships driving into each other during those gales. Some were ground to atoms, and 

 what the ice spared the natives soon destroyed, after pillaging them of everything they 

 pleased." 



Since writing the account of the disaster of 1871, the reports have been received of 

 another of less pecuniary extent but more appalling in its efiect on human life. The 

 fleet for 1876 consisted of twenty ships and barks. Of these, twelve are reported lost 

 or abandoned in the Arctic. Much of the melancholy story seems a duplicate descrip- 

 tion of that of 1871. Again the fleet had entered that fatal ocean early in August, and 

 again commenced the season's whaling with prospect of fair success ; again the ice com- 



* Tlie lowest ebb was reached on tbe 1st of Jauuarj', 1875, when the fleet consisted 

 of 119 ships and barks, and 44 brigs and schooners, with a capacity of 37,733 tons. ^^ 



