480 MR THEODORE E. SALVESEN ON THE 



prosecuting whaling operations in the south by the same methods as employed by the 

 Norwegians in the north, but these efforts were unsuccessful until the year 1903. 



Captain C. A. Larsen of Sandefjord had noticed the enormous numbers of Finner 

 whales when, in command of the sealer Jason, he visited the Antarctic in 1 892 and 

 1893 in search of seals and Right whales, and also about ten years later, as master of 

 the Antarctic, he accompanied Nordenskiold's scientific expedition to the Antarctic 

 regions. His efforts to form a company in his native land to start whaling operations 

 met with no success, but having friends in Buenos Aires, he succeeded in raising 

 sufficient capital there, and the Compania Argentina de Pesca of Buenos Aires was 

 founded, with Captain Larsen as manager. 



He fitted out his expedition in Sandefjord, Norway, and arrived in Cumberland 

 Bay, South Georgia, in December 1904, with one modern steam whaler and two small 

 sailing vessels as transports, and immediately started building a whaling factory in 

 King Edward's Cove, on the same site as had been used for trying-in plant for seal 

 blubber in the early part of the preceding century. The satisfactory results obtained 

 led to the formation of a large number of companies, which now carry on in the depen- 

 dencies of the Falkland Islands the largest whaling business in the world. 



METHODS. 



Before enumerating in detail the various companies presently operating, it may be 

 of interest to have the method of pursuit and capture carried on by the whalers fully 

 explained, as it differs in every essential from that practised by the men who hunted 

 whales in the South Atlantic and Antarctic oceans up to the last decade. 



The successful pursuit and capture of the Finner whales was inaugurated in 1866 by 

 a Norwegian, Captain Svend Foyn, who noticed the large numbers of this species 

 when passing the northern coast of Norway on his way to the Arctic ocean in search of 

 seals. After three years of arduous labour he at last solved the difficulties, and the 

 methods introduced by him, with considerable improvements, are those now in use by 

 all the modern whaling companies the world over. 



In order to be able to pursue the active Finner whales and get within striking 

 distance, Captain Foyn substituted steam propulsion instead of men rowing the whale 

 boats, and he overcame the buoyancy question by increasing the size of the vessel. 

 The most approved type of a modern steam whale-catcher (Pis. I. and II. fig. 1) has a 

 length of from 98 to 115 feet over all, with a beam of 18 to 22 feet, and a moulded 

 depth of from 11 feet to 12 feet 9 inches, flush-decked, and cut away at both bow and 

 stern in order to make the vessel answer her helm very quickly. The lines of the hull 

 are designed for a speed of from 11 to 12 knots, and the engines are from 350 to 650 

 effective horse-power. Steam steering-gear is provided in order to operate the rudder 

 to most advantage, and a powerful double whaling-winch of two cylinders each is fitted 

 on the deck abaft the foremast. In the bow a glycerine recoil muzzle-loading cannon 

 is fixed on a swivel, and so delicately balanced that, when loaded with powder and 



