THE ECONOMICS OF WHALING 47 



difficult of capture, could not defy the modern steam 

 whaling methods of the Norwegians in the waters 

 of the Falkland Island Dependencies for a decade. 



Once the decline has set in, no ameliorative 

 measures which have yet been tried have been 

 efficacious in stopping it, with the inevitable result 

 that there has followed a total cessation of whaling 

 for that particular species, or for the particular area. 

 Moreover, in no case has the cessation of whaling 

 taken place sufficiently soon to render possible the 

 recovery of the whales to any appreciable extent. 



The successive phases in the history of whaling 

 described in the succeeding chapters have been, for 

 the most part, only possible because either a new 

 species has been attacked, or a new haunt of . a 

 previously attacked species has been discovered. 

 In the latter case, it is more than probable that a 

 distinct variety of the original species has been the 

 object of the fishery, though of this there i ., 

 unfortunately, no positive evidence. The Atlantic 

 Right Whale, or Biscay Whale or Nordcaper, was 

 the object of the first regular whale fishery, that of 

 the Basques, which originated probably a thousand 

 years ago in the Bay of Biscay. It is probable that 

 early whaling voyages, of which all record is now 

 lost, by the Basques, in pursuit of this whale, took 

 place to the Norwegian coast on the one hand, and 

 to Newfoundland on the other. 



Most probably, the earliest voyages of the 

 Bretons to the Newfoundland Banks for the cod 

 fishery were preceded by voyages of the Basques 



