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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O. 885

22 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

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caldy was still interested as well as Dundee and Peterhead, but all the other ports in the foregoing list had ceased to send ships, although part of crews continued each season to come from one or other of them. The jute trade enjoyed wonderfully prosperous times during the American War, in the absence of the cotton, and this would give a great impetus to sealing and whaling in Dundee for the oil required to soften the jute fibre.

Coming farther down the nineteenth century (1880)-whaling was most prosperous then so far as Dundee was concerned, but it was not so as a large industry considered from all the standpoints before indicated.

In the next decade it was possibly still more prosperous, if it be considered from the returns it brought to the shareholders, but it was still less prosperous in the larger sense. Prices of "bone" continued to rise to such a figure that whaling really ceased to be a trade. It was gambling-gambling, with the degeneration which always accompanies it.

What are the cause or causes of its failure?--The following may be cited in reply to this question:-

(a) The difficulty in obtaining ships built of wood. (They are not now built

at Dundee, neither does it seem possible to obtain foreign-built ones.) (b) The increased cost of working expenses, insurance, and stores, and wages. The ships (c) Practically nothing had been done to train mates and masters.

carried only one mate. To fill vacancies outsiders had to be found, who required to spend years in learning.

(d) The whole trade depended on the masters, for the owners and managing owners did not, as a rule, know anything of how the trade was actually carried on.

(e) Competition in whaling in other parts of the world leading to the fall

in prices from their phenomenal point.

(f) The use of steam as an auxiliary power in whalers, and the use of the

harpoon gun which hastened the time when--

(g) "Right" whales and other species hunted in northern waters

practically extinct.

were

Of all these causes, the last is, of course, all-sufficient.

A. S.,

Mercantile Marine Office,

Superintendent.

Board of Trade,

Leith.

10th September, 1913.

WHALING IN THE ARCTIC AND ELSEWHERE.

Supplementary statement by the Superintendent, Mercantile Marine Office, Board of Trade, Leith, on the question of the necessity or otherwise of the regulating of whaling in the Southern Pacific and the Antarctic and elsewhere, considered in the light of the experience of Scottish whaling in the Arctic.

Scottish Any little light that I have on the subject appears to me in this way. whalers have all along been occupied in capturing and killing the so-called "right' whale. Their season usually commenced about March, when they sailed for the sealing on the west side of Greenland, returning to Scotland in April at the end of a voyage lasting only about six weeks. After about a week's stay they sailed for the whaling in Davis Strait, passing farther north through Baffin Bay and beyond as the advancing season allowed, returning to Scotland again about the middle of October. I am speaking of the years 1875-1880. After these years, some vessels went to the east side of Greenland for seals and also for whales, and still later Scottish vessels sailed earlier in the year than March for Newfoundland to take part in the sealing off the Labrador coast, afterwards proceeding, as formerly, to Davis Strait, and the bays and sounds there, for whaling.

In all this sealing and whaling there was no regulation by law, or by any Govern- r by the ships or companies themselves, as to what should be taken or what should not be taken.

I doubt if the whalers in previous generations killed whales indiscriminately. From 1880 onwards, however, there is no doubt that this was done. The reports of

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their catches, "three small fish," &c., and the size of the bone obtained proved not that small whales had been killed, but that immature whales had been. The reports of catches which were also made of " a cow and a sucker' or calf " proved it. Signs of the decay of the trade began to appear. It was then that, rather than return "clean," the produce became more miscellaneous, bottle-nose whales were taken, and so were" white whales."

The question is, is this species of the whale family, the "right whale," all but extinct? This is, of course, very much a matter of opinion, on which I am not qualified to express myself; but my belief is that the opinion of most of those qualified to give one is that this species of the genus is all but extinct, and that this is the natural result of young as well as old whales being ruthlessly killed.

33829

No. 36.

A. SMITH,

FOREIGN OFFICE to COLONIAL OFFICE (Received 30 September, 1913.)

Superintendent.

[Copy to Governor-General of Union of South Africa, 9 October, 1913. Confidential (3). L.F.]

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs presents his compliments to the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, and, by direction of the Secretary of State, transmits herewith copy of a despatch from His Majesty's Representative at Lisbon, No. 69, dated September 13, respecting the preservation of whales.

Reference to previous letter: Foreign Office, July 24.* Foreign Office,

September 29, 1913.

Enclosure in No. 36.

(No. 69. Africa.) SIR,

Lisbon, September 13th, 1913. On the receipt of the instructions contained in your despatch of this series, of the 24th of July last, I spoke to Senhor Macieira unofficially on the subject of the preservation of whales; and at His Excellency's request I sent to him on August 7th a memorandum, in which I mentioned that His Majesty's Govern- ment proposed to invite the Powers to consider this question at a Conference; that they had put a stop to the grant of further whaling facilities in the Falkland Islands and their dependencies; and that they would be gratified to learn that the Portuguese Government saw their way to adopt a similar course in Angola.

I am now in receipt of the reply of the Portuguese Government in the form of a memorandum, translation of which I have the honour to enclose, expressing the willingness of the Portuguese Government to take part in an International Con- ference on this subject, but retaining its rights to grant licences to Portuguese citizens, if and when the completion of the investigations specified in Article II. of the whale-fishing law of July 16th permits an increase of the number of licences now existing. This Article reads as follows:-

"The number of concessions for whale fishing in the waters of Angola and Mozambique will be limited to those actually existing until the regu- lations, the study of the fishery regions, the reports of the local authorities or of technical commissions appointed for the purpose furnish the necessary data for fixing their number in proportion to the abundance of whales in the waters of South Africa."

I have, &c.,

The Right Honourable

Sir Edward Grey, Bart., K.G., M.P.,

&c., &c.,

&c.

• 25602 not printed.

CHARLES WINGFIELD,

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