54 SEALS AND WHALES OF TLiE BRLTISH SEAS. 



of the Northern range of this species, says he is quite satisfied that " no 

 Whale could inhabit at the present day the frozen sea to the north of 

 Robeson Channel. To penetrate from the North-water of Baffin Bay to 

 Robeson Channel, would be a hazardous task for this great animal, and in 

 this opinion the experienced whaling quartermasters, who accompanied our 

 Expedition, coincided. We may dismiss from our minds the idea or hope 

 that nearer to the Pole, and beyond the limits of present discovery, there may 

 be haunts in the Polar Sea suitable for the Right-whale. I do not look for 

 the speedy extinction of the Greenland Whale ; but it is probable that in 

 a few years the fishing will no longer prove profitable to the fine fleet of 

 whalers that now sail from our northern ports, and I see no hope of Arctic 

 discovery increasing our knowledge of the range of this animal."* 



The southern limit of the Right-whale in the Northern ocean may be 

 shown by a line drawn from the coast of Lapland at 70°, just touching the 

 southern point of Iceland, and ending on the coast of Labrador at about 

 55° north latitude. 



The whaling-trade, which once employed so many hardy seamen, is now 

 reduced to very narrow limits, and appears to have passed almost entirely into 

 the hands of the English, or rather Scotch. The Biscayans were not content 

 with exterminating the Whales found in their own seas, but in 172 1 they had 

 twenty vessels in the Greenland fishery ; the Dutch also took a large part in 

 the trade; and in the year 1680, when they appear to have been the most 

 actively engaged in the fishery, they are said to have had about 260 ships and 

 14,000 men employed. In 1725 the South Sea Company embarked in the 

 trade, but meeting with considerable losses, speedily gave it up. The Gov- 

 ernment, in order to encourage this languishing branch of industry, in 1732 

 granted a bounty of 20s. per ton on the oil ; this, being found insufficient, 



* Zoologist, 1877, p. 360. 



