Connecticut western news., 1879-08-06
ARCTIC WHALERS.
AN INTERESTING ARTICLE ON WHALING
 VESSELS AND THEIR WORK.

much II terest the arrival in San Fran
 cisco of the Arctic trader General liar. ney, looked for within ten days. This vessel was dispatched from the Colder Gate in May last with stores to the twen
 ty whalers cruising in the northern waters and to bring back their seasons catch of oil and bone. Seventeen of the fleet are New Bedford vessels the other three are from San Francisco {; so that that the General Harney's arrival has something of local interest. Just now there are fifteen whalers at the wharves in New Bedford, and should the news from the Arctic be that small catch had been taken the idle whalers will proba- bly, all be dismantled and be laid up un- til early next spring, when, if the mar kets improve, they will be fitted for the usual three years cruise. There are at present I86 vessels all told engaged in whale fishery against 66S in 1854. New Bedford continues to lead in the busi- ness. Counting the ten Scotch steam whalers now at work in Bafin's Bay, | ports outside of New Bedford. It may be interesting to recall that when the business was at it's height in 1854 New Bedford fitted out 419, Nantucket AT, Provincetown 27, Fairhaven 49 and New London 55. The previous year the re- ceipts of bone were 5,632, 300 pou nds, against 2O7, 259 in 1878, the prices rang ing in 1854 from 34 to 40 cents, against $2.50 to $3 the present year. The re- ceipts of oil were in 1854 POS, ,000 bar rels, against 4O,0OO in 1879. In this year of heavy receipts there were 552 vessels in the Arctic fisheries. There is very little change in the whaling grounds outside of the Arctic seas. The whales run down early in the summer into the southern attitudes to " calve, !" but in returning they keep very much closer to the ice, and in the Arctic run under and alongside the fields and bergs. For twenty years the whalers had not followed the fish west of Point Barrows, but in 1875 the fleet went as far as Camden Bay, and four of the vessels were aban- doned, since which time not vestige of these vessels has been met with. The fleet has never been so far west since, Harrison's Bay being considered we'll to the westward. But as New Bedford parties are now building steam Arctic whaler at Bath, Me-, the first of this class ever sent from the United States, there may be great change in the Arc tic fishing grounds, and a more economic method of following the schools discov- cred. This steamer will fit away in Sep tember. It will go direct to and cruise along both coasts of Patagonia, where the whaling this season has been un- usually fine; thence it will run up along the off shore and tbe line grounds, touch ing in at San Francisco, after cruising through the Society and Sandwich Islands, discharging the catch and by June next it will steam directly into the Arctic seas.
 THE WHALING INDUSTRY.
 The Indian Ocean fleet and the two vessels of the New Zealand coast have been fairly successful, but the sperm season of the west coast of New Holland, in Australia, and the catch in the vicinity of the Desolation Islands, southeast of Africa, at last accounts were poor. It is in the last named locality, and also in the Indian Ocean, that the whalers look in each catch for that knot of diseased lntestines known as ambergris, which weighs from forty to two hundred pounds, and is usually more valuable than the whole cargo of oil and bone. The last lot brought into New Bedford was on the Caroline Gibbs, 125 pounds. The whale was taken off the Tristan Islands, in the South Atlantic, and the lot was sold for 1925, ,O0O to 8 Boston druggist. It may be interesting to know that this most disagreeable stuff is used in the manufacture of perfumes. New Bed ford outftters claim that unless vessel can take 2,500 barrels of sperm oil in three years oil fishing will not pay. As few have reached this quantity in the voyages ending the past year, more at tention IS being given to catching the right whale in the Arctic, in which the bone is more valuable. The consump- tion of sperm oil has been abridged principally by the introduction of lard oil. Nothing would so rejoice the sor- did heart of whaleman as hog cholera at the West. The failure of the men, haden season this summer is bit of encouragement to holders of humpback and similar classes of whale oil. This is thick oil that does not strain clear, and is largely used by tanners and cur riers. The oils taken in the South seas are somewhat similar, but the Arctic oils are clear and limpid, and are used both for burning and lubricating purposes. Sperm oil is used almost exclusively as 8 spindle lubricant, the English spin ners taking from us about 20, ,OO0 barrels year. Last fall when the catch was large and the market dull, prices fell of to eighty-five cents. This seemed sc very low that Englishmen came over and bought on speculation out of New Bed. l ford about 15, 1000 barrels at eighty-twc cents. But the mal ket has since receded to seventy five cents, with stock of about 50,OOO barrels on hand, and the spinners at Oldham and other large English man. ufacturing centres idle on account of { strike. The sale of whalebone is very large in Paris and Berlin, where tho leading o1odastes make women's COS
 tunes an art Since the 1onp train, have been fashionable the sale of bonel 7 that will cut ten feet lengths have com { manded extra nricas Whalehona run