388 WHALES, SEALS, AND SEA-SERPENTS 



Straits and Baffin's Bay, and to the neighbourhood 

 of Behring Straits. It is in the last of these regions 

 that the species seems still to exist in the greatest 

 plenty. Much has been written about the annual 

 migrations of the whale, southward in autumn and 

 northward with the retreating ice. In the Davis 

 Straits Fishery the old males come southward in early 

 winter along the west coast of Greenland, the females 

 and young animals taking a different course in the 

 direction of Hudson Straits. In spring the males go 

 westward from the neighbourhood of Disco, and meet 

 the females somewhere about Baffin's Bay. When 

 the ice in Lancaster Sound breaks up, the whales pass 

 northward, and their chief haunt in summer is in the 

 neighbourhood of Prince Regent's Inlet. 



The Greenland Whale is deep bluish-black in colour 

 over the back, and grey upon the belly ; the neck and 

 throat are white. 



Long before the Arctic whale fishery began, a very 

 ancient and important fishery was carried on from the 

 Basque cities. Of this fishery records are said to exist 

 as far back as the ninth century, and when other 

 nations began the pursuit of the whale it was Basque 

 sailors who taught them the trade and accompanied 

 them as harpooners. " Harpoon " itself is said to be a 

 Basque word. This Basque fishery was very flourishing 

 in the sixteenth century, and only became extinct in 

 the beginning of the eighteenth. We owe to the great 

 surgeon, Ambrose Pare, an account of the fishery at 

 its chief seat, Biarritz. 



The Biscayan Whale differs from the Polar or Green- 

 land Whale in several minor characters, but the chief 

 difference is in the smaller head, and the correspond- 

 ingly shorter whalebone ; this does not exceed 7 feet 

 in length, and is of a coarser quality than that of the 



