THE EUROPEAN SEAS. 



37 



whale fishery was commenced by English enterprise 

 in the Spitzbergen seas, and rich, indeed, must have 

 been the products of the venturers, since, so late as 

 the year I have just noticed, the fish were abun- 

 dant. When Mr. Scoresby, in the year 1820, pub- 

 lished his " History of the Whale Fishery," the 

 whales still frequented those seas in considerable 

 numbers. In 1840 they had left them apparently 

 for good and all. Professor Jameson, in a note on 

 the state of the fisheries, published in his valuable 

 journal during that year, states that "the whale 

 fisheries between Spitzbergen and Greenland are 

 abandoned. Fishers now prefer Davis Straits, Baf- 

 fin's Bay, or the seas to the east of Greenland." 

 Davis Straits is now likely to be deserted, and the 

 whale fishery is diminishing, the number of whale- 

 ships decreasing yearly. Thus has the activity of 

 man done much towards rendering one of the 

 mightiest of living animals well nigh extinct. If 

 this fishery be pursued for a century longer, the 

 Greenland whale may take its station with creatures 

 that have been. 



The rorquals, or, fin- whales, still hold their places 

 in these seas. Their rapid movements defy the 

 efforts of human enemies, though probably all their 

 activity would be of little avail were they suffi- 

 ciently remunerative for the trouble of killing them. 

 The mightiest of all leviathans, the Balaenoptera 

 hoops, is among their number, growing to the vast 

 length of one hundred feet and more. The B. hoops, 



