314 WHALING AND BEAR-HUNTING 



RETURNS FROM WHALING 



Taking in the other islands of the Falkland Islands De- 

 pendencies in the neighbourhood of Cape Horn, the catch in 

 a recent year amounted to four hundred and thirty thousand 

 barrels of oil eight thousand three hundred and seventy- 

 five tons guano, the gross value of which may be reckoned at 

 1,360,000. Practically the whole of this goes to Norway. 



For forty-eight years this Modern Whaling has been 

 carried on in the North Atlantic, and since 1904 the Modern 

 Whaling which we advocated in Edinburgh in 1895 has been 

 prosecuted by Norwegians in the South Atlantic from desolate 

 barren British possessions, with the great results mentioned 

 above. There are vast areas of ocean teeming with these 

 whales where, so far, they have not been hunted, and still the 

 general British public stands aloof and takes no share in it. 

 Whaling to-day, from the Norwegian point of view, is an 

 industry : three generations have been brought up on it ; 

 but from the average British point of view it is still a 

 speculation. 



AMBERGRIS 



Ambergrjs is a biliary concretion generally found in the 

 alimentary canal of a feeble or diseased sperm whale. 

 Sometimes it is found exteriorly near the vent. It is also 

 found floating or drifted ashore. It is of great value, 

 and is principally used as the basis or vehicle for 

 perfumes. 



Some years ago Norwegians found four hundred and twenty 

 kilos in a sperm on the Australian coast ; this was valued 

 at 27,000. This is much the largest piece I have heard of. 



It is a solid, fatty substance of a marbled grey-and-black 

 appearance, and generally contains the beaks of cuttle-fish, 

 which form the principal food of the cachalot or sperm 

 whale. When fresh it has an intolerable smell, but after 

 exposure this goes, and leaves what some people call a 

 " peculiar sweet earthy odour." It burns with a pale blue 

 flame and melts somewhat like sealing-wax. 



