WHALING IN THE BAY. 1 27 



off the beach opposite the oil factory, 

 where the blubber would soon be con- 

 verted into some twenty barrels of oil. 



Most whales sink as soon as they are 

 dead, and rise to the surface again after 

 three or four days, when they are secured 

 by the whalers. The lances are marked 

 with the whaler's initials so as to enable 

 him to prove his property. It has recently 

 been decided in the United States district 

 court for the district of Massachusetts, in a 

 very important case in which Provincetown 

 and Wellfleet parties were interested, that 

 these dead whales belong to the whalers 

 who kill them, and not to the man who 

 happens to tow them ashore. It was held 

 that the killing of a whale with a bomb- 

 lance was a sufficient appropriation of a 

 wild animal {fercz natures) to constitute 

 property. Had the decision of the court 

 been otherwise, the whaling industry at the 

 Cape would soon become extinct. 



