n8 
THE LIVING WORLD. 
The whale fisheries towards the close of the sixteenth century had employed 
over two hundred and fifty Dutch ships and upwards of fourteen thousand 
Dutch sailors, not to speak of the smaller contributions of other nations then 
engaged in the whale fishing. The supply of hardy navigators required to 
man the many vessels of discovery, which followed in the path of Columbus, 
was doubtless due to the value of sea-fishing as an industry, and the desire 
to gain what could readily be converted into gold. No period of American 
history is richer than the period of discovery in interest for the lover of ex¬ 
citing adventures. Fascinating as it is to read about the unknown, the strange, 
the terrible, the search therefor requires many of man’s most valued quali¬ 
ties, and while increasing his knowledge, adds uniformly to the accumu¬ 
lated wealth of mankind and to the extension of its industries. The navigator 
created opportunities 
for many and varied 
sorts of labor, not only 
directly by employing 
sailors and shipwrights, 
and by requiring an 
infinite number of ship- 
stores, but even more 
by the product which 
he brought home, and 
by the stimulus which 
his novel experiences 
gave to the imaginations 
of men. During the 
time of English discov¬ 
eries in America, it will 
b e remembered that 
Spain had grown so 
rich that its galleons 
bearing gold became a 
Greenland whai,e. favorite obj ect of piracy. 
_ Sir Walter Raleigh, it 
will be remembered, got himself into trouble with his king, because in or- 
der to redeem his promise of returning later with gold, he selected as the 
location for his mining the Spanish ships. So too the Americans, during the 
Revolution, derived aid from the fact that the English fisheries being inter¬ 
rupted, those who had no other occupation were violently opposed to such Par¬ 
liamentary action as destroyed their means of livelihood. Thus are the selfish 
interests of men overruled to beneficent ends by Divine providence. The 
material instinct of the whale has been less dwelt upon than similar other ani- 
rnals, probably because the whale is less open to observation, and because the 
sailor s yarn has come to be regarded with an unnecessary suspicion. Mar- 
\el ous as are the fictions of man, the wonders of nature are even greater, 
especially when recited by one who restrains his imagination by well-authen- 
ticated scientific observations. 
The wonders of-God’s universe are as astonishing as His abundant pro¬ 
vision and constant care for His creatures. That “all' is fair in war,” seems 
