400 IN VADSO HARBOUR. 



the ground is thickly covered with cods' heads, also dry- 

 ing. These, when in proper condition, will be ground 

 into a white meal-like powder, and, under the name of 

 " fish guano," exported for manure. 



Fish guano, cod-liver oil, and dried cod-fish are not, 

 however, the only commercial resources of Vadso. or we 

 should not have introduced it in these pages. It has of 

 late years risen into importance in connection with the 

 whale-fishery. An enterprising Norwegian, M. Sven 

 Foyn, has improved on the murderous methods suggested 

 by Thiercelin and Devisme, and invented some projectiles 

 of peculiarly deadly power, solely for use against the mon- 

 ster of the deep. The bow of his vessels is equipped with 

 small swivel-guns, from which is fired a compound pro- 

 jectile, consisting of a harpoon with hinged barbs or flukes. 

 These, while the harpoon is on its deadly course, lie snugly 

 down by the side of the harpoon shaft ; but when it has 

 entered the flesh of the whale, and the shaft is drawn 

 backwards, they open out, piercing the flesh sideways aifd 

 obliquely, until checked by the stop of the hinge. Thus 

 they obtain a firm hold, and effectually prevent the with- 

 drawal of the barb. Nor is this all. The harpoon is also 

 furnished with explosive shells, so designed as to burst 

 within the hapless leviathan's " too solid flesh," and de- 

 stroy him almost instantaneously. A towing cable is 

 then attached to his ample nose, and his huge slate-coloured 

 carcass is triumphantly towed into Yadso harbour. 



" I have just returned," says a writer in a contemporary 

 journal, "from a rowing excursion round a dead whale, 

 which at a distance looks like one of the low rounded 

 island-rocks that abound in the harbour; and, indeed, 

 might be mistaken for one, were it not for a curious flat 



