114 
PIIOSFHORESCENCE OF THE SEA. 
by the American and the European vessels engaged in this 
fishery would form an island of no inconsiderable dimensions, 
and each one of those taken must have consumed, in the 
course of his growth, many times his own weight of mollusks. 
The destruction of the whales must have been followed by a 
proportional increase of the organisms they feed upon, and if 
we had the means of comparing the statistics of these humble 
forms of life, for even so short a period as that between the 
years 1760 and 1860, we should find a difference sufficient 
possibly, to suggest an explanation of some phenomena at 
present unaccounted for. 
For instance, as I have observed in another work,* the 
phosphorescence of the sea was unknown to ancient writers, or 
at least scarcely noticed by them, and even Homer—who, 
blind as tradition makes him when he composed his epics, had 
seen, and marked, in earlier life, all that the glorious nature 
of the Mediterranean and its coasts discloses to unscientific 
observation—nowhere alludes to this most beautiful and strik¬ 
ing of maritime wonders. In the passage just referred to, I 
have endeavored to explain the silence of ancient writers with 
respect to this as well as other remarkable phenomena on psy¬ 
chological grounds; but is it not possible that, in modem times, 
the animalculse which produce it may have immensely multi¬ 
plied, from the destruction of their natural enemies by man, 
and hence that the gleam shot forth by their decomposition, or 
by their living processes, is both more frequent and more brill¬ 
iant than in the days of classic antiquity ? 
Although the whale does not prey upon smaller creatures 
resembling himself in form and habits, yet true fishes are 
extremely voracious, and almost every tribe devours unspar- 
supply of petroleum, which is much used for lubricating machinery as well 
as for numerous other purposes, has produced a more perceptible effect on 
the whale fishery than any other single circumstance. According to Bige¬ 
low, Les Mats TJnis en 1863, p. 346, the American whaling fleet was 
diminished by 29 in 1858, 57 in 1860, 94 in 1861, and 65 in 1862. The 
present number of American ships employed in that fishery is 353. 
* The Origin and History of the English Language, &c., pp. 423, 424. 
