NOTES ON THE SEAL AND WHALE FISHERY, 1885. 101 
important industry from extinction. The Seals would be larger, 
and, perhaps, not in such fine condition as on the 5th, but 
the advantage would make itself apparent in the increased 
numbers which would in a few years be found on the ice at 
the breeding-season. Surely, seeing the hopeless condition to 
which the sealing is being reduced, the experiment is at least 
worth trying, if only for a few seasons. 
Turning to the Right Whale fishery, the deficiency is even 
still more conspicuous, as compared with the season of 1884. 
The Davis Straits vessels return 27 Right Whales (to which must 
be added the oil and bone of two whales brought home by the 
‘Germania’ from a Cumberland Gulf station), against 79, and 
the Greenland ships 12 as against 11 fish in the previous year ; 
the whole resulting in 510 tons of oil and 418 cwt. of bone 
compared with 912 tons of the former and 932 ewt. of the latter 
in 1884. And this falling off in produce is also attended by a 
serious reduction in price, whale-oil being difficult to dispose of 
at £20 per ton, and whalebone, which in 1884 sold for £2250 
per ton, having this season been sold for £1100! The probable 
value of the produce would thus be £31,800 against £88,570 in 
the season of 1884. 
The Bottle-nose fishery, too, in consequence of the number 
of small Norwegian vessels which have been attracted by the 
profits of past seasons, has fallen off from 317 fish and 312 tons 
of oil to 84 fish and 51 tons of oil this year, and even this 
reduced quantity, owing to the forced sales of the small owners 
engaged in the fishery, is probably not worth more than £28 per 
ton, whereas three years ago it readily sold for £60. Large stocks 
of this oil are also, I believe, held by the more wealthy owners. 
Amongst the small game brought home by the Davis Straits 
vessels were about 200 White Whales, 220 Narwhals, and the 
usual number of White Bears; also about 190 Walrus, which 
were killed by the Davis Straits vessels. The Greenland vessels 
rarely meet with the Walrus, as it is pretty well exterminated at 
Spitzbergen by the Norwegians ; an occasional solitary individual, 
however, which has become carnivorous and wandered far from 
his native shore in search of Seals, is sometimes met with far 
out at sea (antea, p. 54). At Franz Josef Land, according to 
Mr. Leigh Smith, they are very numerous, and I am also 
informed that in Frobisher’s Straits they are still plentiful; 
