Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 January 1875 — The Whale-Fishery. [ARTICLE]

The Whale-Fishery.

The Pall Mall Gazette gives some statistics on the whale-fishery, which, though limited to England, serve to indicate the decline of this industry among all nations. In 1814, 143 English ships were engaged in whaling, with a result of the capture of 1,981 “ fish” and the produce of 19,408 tons of oil. As an example of “ the luck’’ of the fishery, it is mentioned that one ship came home “ clean,’’ another obtained but one fish, whilst a third captured forty. In 1824, the British whaling fleet had dropped to 111 vessels, and the number of fish taken was 761. In 1834 the number of whalers was reduoed to 76: in 1844 to 32. The take of fish this last year amounted to 125, yielding 2,000 tons of oil and 89 tons of whalebone. In 1854 the British whalers numbered 53, and the catch was 97 whales. The first record of the capture of seals by English vessels occurs in 1841, when the Peterhead boats pulled 19,180. Seal oil was at that time worth from $165 to S2OO per ton. In 1844 the capture of 48 seals is recorded; in 1854, of 59,801. ^ — __ During the last twenty years the whale fishery has still further declined—not, as the Gazette urges, on account of the invention of gas, but because of the great scarcity of whales and the excessive peril of the occupation. The Greenland whale is almost entirely exterminated and other species have been so reduced in numbers as to make their capture an unprofitable adventure, while no industry of the sea is so fraught with disaster to those engaged in it. —Chicago Tribune.