' ON THE GREENLAND RIGHT-WHALE. 13 



factory founded by him on a small island a little off the present factory of Godthaab, nor further 

 to the south ; and, besides, it is seen by a passage in his journal that the Greeulanders from the 

 southernmost part of the country at that time not unfrequently undertook long journeys northwards 

 for the purpose of whahng, which of course would have been unnecessary if the whale had been 

 to be met with near the place of their abode.^ It is true that Egede, on asking, was informed 

 that whales were to be found near the Pissubik Islands, about seven miles north of his dweUing- 

 place, but those whom he on that account sent thither brought back the intelligence that only 

 humpbacks (" Krepokaks," Megaptera boops, Pbr.), at that time, as at present, were in the 

 habit of visiting these islands.^ As Egede would not believe this discomforting news, 

 he went to the place himself on the 8th of November, 1723, but was forced to acknowledge 

 that the information given him was true. Yet his journey was not quite in vain, for on that 

 occasion he was informed, on good authority, that the Greenland whale, or, as he expresses 

 himself, " de store Hvale af den rette Sort, som har store Barder" (the large whales of the right 

 sort, having large whalebone), must be sought for about eight days' journey further northwards, 

 near the small island of Nepisene (two or three miles south of the factory of Holsteinsborg), 

 where the Greenlanders used to catch them during the winter, in the months of February and 

 March ;^ exactly the place where afterwards one of the most important establishments of whale- 

 fishing was founded, near the Fiords of Nepisene and Amertlok, the only one still remaining on 

 the coast. 



But when once it has been settled that at the time of Egede the whale was not to be found 

 beyond its present southern limits, no further proofs are needed that in times of greater antiquity 

 the whale did not transgress those limits, and that its range in the sea along the west coast of 

 Greenland has never been different from the present ; for it was not until the year 1719 that 

 the European nations, and more especially the Dutch, began regularly, every year, to send a part 

 of their whaling vessels into Davis Strait.* The whale-fishery of the Greenlanders themselves 

 being too insignificant to be taken into account, the whales had, until the arrival of Egede, 

 been almost undisturbed in the sea at present under consideration. Supposing it even to be 

 true that the whale, by constant persecution, might be chased further northwards, yet nothing of 

 the kind has taken place here, and thus the only grounds are taken away on which a supposition 

 might be founded that the range of the whale's visits along the coast in question had been 

 altered. Having, however, been brought into a regular train in this sea, the whale-fishery has 

 been carried on with great eagerness until the latest time. During a long series of years 

 Davis Strait and Disco Bay have been the principal places of resort of the whalers, and in the 

 course of fifty-nine years (from 1719 until 1778) the Dutch alone caught 6986 whales in 

 these places.^ It is true that the political changes occasioned by the French Revolution at 

 the close of the last century put a stop to the Dutch whale-fishing trade, but, at the 

 same time, the English began to carry on a brisker trade, which they extended, from 1817, to 

 the most northerly part of Baffin's Bay as well as to Lancaster and Barrow Straits, the old 

 fishing-places having begun to yield smaller profits. During four years only, from 1827 to 1830, 



1 Lcc. cit., p. 98. "" Log. cit., p. 121. ^ Loc. cit., p. 123. 



* Scoresby, W., ' An Account of the Arctic Regions,' vol. ii, p. 64. 



^ De Jong, Kobel, Salieth, ' De Walvischvangst, met veele Byzonderlieden daartoe betrekkelyk. 

 Tveede Deel,' p. 113, seq. 



