BRIEF SKETCH OF THE TOOTHED WHALES. 103 



speak for themselves, and corroborate the opinions expressed 

 eight years ago as to the International Scheme* : — " The 

 Government having elected to test, for instance, whether the 

 views stated in the ' Kesources of the Sea ' hold, or if the 

 opinions of the vast majority of the fishing population and 

 others are more worthy of confidence, viz. that great deteriora- 

 tion [in the sea] has been caused by man, and that man can by 

 various measures control that deterioration, it may after all be 

 best patiently to wait for the result. Though the experience 

 may be costly, it may likewise be salutary. Yet there is no fear 

 of extinction of any species, especially of those important to 

 man." Before and since that was written hatcheries for sea- 

 fishes have striven for the cure of this " impoverishment," yet 

 they have not convinced many experienced observers of their 

 necessity, and have not yet given undoubted proof of their 

 benefits, though there is no objection to affording a longer 

 period of probation if that were demanded. A few ''schools" 

 of Porpoises or of the larger Whales would rapidly dispose of the 

 comparatively small (though costly) additions on this head with- 

 out affecting the general supply. Again, the ovarian contents of 

 a few fishmongers' shops in March would far outnumber the 

 total of the larvas placed in the sea by the laborious efforts of 

 all the hatcheries, yet the balance is unaltered. The scale of 

 Nature's work in the ocean is beyond the action of such pigmy 

 measures, and the study of the relation of the fish-eating Whales 

 to the fisheries shows how completely beyond man's power it is 

 to affect the survival of the ordinary food-fishes in the sea. 



■•• ' British Fisheries' Investigations and the International Scheme,' 

 Dundee, April, 1903, p. 33. 



