178 SIR WILLIAM FLOWER CHAP. 



right whales very abundant in the month of 

 December. On the strength of this observation it 

 has been thought that a whale corresponding to 

 the Arctic right whale might be found in the 

 Antarctic seas. Two years ago (1896) some ships 

 sailed from Dundee in the hope of meeting it, but 

 were completely disappointed. No trace of such 

 whales were found ; for doubtless Sir James Ross 

 had only come across the winter haunts of the same 

 which were then undergoing the process of ruth- 

 less extermination in their breeding-places on the 

 Australian and New Zealand coasts." 



Since then other expeditions to the Antarctic 

 Ocean have ascertained that not a single one of 

 these right whales survives. At the other Pole the 

 whales, instead of coming ashore to breed, have 

 their calves by the edge of the ice, under which 

 they retreat when attacked, and have thus managed 

 to survive. 



Among the details of the story of the British 

 whale fishery, Flower traced it all round our southern 

 and eastern coasts by the remains of whales found 

 often at the most insignificant seaside villages. 



The great jaw-bones, which remained after the 

 whalebone was taken out, were used as gate-posts, 

 arches to garden walks, or parts of arbours. These 

 still remain in such places as Leigh, and Gravesend, 

 Yarmouth, Wells -next-the- Sea, Whitby, and other 

 ports farther north. The present writer was once 

 in the street of the little village of Cley, in Norfolk, 



