Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1902-09-29
WHALES NOT IN DEMAND
FEW LEVlATHANS LEFT AND THEY
ARE NOT MUCH HUNTED,

| Seas of Earth's Largest Creatures - 1t
Was MIR. Rockefeller who showed tho
| World How to Live without whales.
| For the whale these are, in the Ian
| guage of Jack Miller's farewell, Hap
py days and many of EN-" exclaims
the Boston Evening Transcript. After
a strenuous life of four centuries this
+ is the coffee-and-cigars, the easy-chair-
and-slippers period of his existence.
| Since the time when Columbus crossed
| the Atlantic he has been hunted and
| harried from Arctic pillar to tropic
| post, but the economic cycle has passed
and for the present the whale is en-
| joying period of comparative secur-
| ity, when he may roam the waters in
| peace, multiply and people once more
| the depleted seas. Let none begrudge
him his repose. The whale deserves
well of the world. What he has in his
humble way contributed to the intel
| lectual development of the human race
only the imaginative can compute, only
| the ungrateful deny. For four CEN
turies he fed the scholars lamp and
the victor's torch. For so much of
literature and of science as we owe to
midnight oiP' the thoughtful and the
| generous will give the whale due cred
| it. But the service he has long per-
formed is now done better by another
agency, and he enjoys a comparative
ly unmolested rest.
One day last March, tale came UP
from the tropics as weird as the rank
est yarn that ever came out of a
fo'c's'le, but verified as accurately as
a government report. The New Bed
| ford whaling bark Kathleen was float
ing calmly in a placid sea, when she
caught the attention of giant fin
back. He swan up in his majestic
way, and when within few yards of
the ship he dived just below the sur
face and moved slowly beneath the
keel. Then he rose quickly and saw
| agely, in the manner of a buclsing
bronco, until the ship was sheer above
the water. 1t toppled over on it's side,
the whale moved on a few feet and
then, with an angry flip of his tail,
knocked the bark to smithereens.
Now, that may be considered the des-
perate parting shot of a maddened,
long-hunted fugitive, the climax of an
ancient feud. Only in order to look on
/ it in this way, we shall have to give
the whale credit for carrying about in
| that huge head of his kind of Mach
| iavellian subtlety and a mind for deep
planned revenge. And as every old
whaler knows, the only thing in a
whales head is some three or four
tons of liquid spermaceti, worth in
the New Bedford market about $50 a
| barrel. 1t is a pity this prosaic fact
is so, for it forbids us to indulge in
the poetic fancy of imagining the
whale as entertaining feeling of
gratitude to the Standard Oil COM
pany and erecting monuments in the
deep to the glory of John ID. Rookie
feller, who is chiefly responsible for
his emancipation. The petroleum age
for the world spells golden age for
the whale.
| Down on the ancient business streets
of Boston, Purchase, High and India,
and along the old wharves, you will
find score perhaps of weather-beat-
en- gilt signs which proclaim that
| those within sell, among other things,
Sperm and whale-oil, sperm candles
and whalebone." But those signs tell
not the truth. They are signs of moth
| ing at all but the conservatism of the
Boston business man, who changes his
wares to meet new demands, but
changes not his sign above him. The
prowling newspaper man who asks
the junior partner for information
/ about the whale-oil trade is met by
an amazed stare and Acknowledgment
"Great Scott, man, wake up; this is
1902. We don't deal in whale-oil. We
sell mineral oils" And when you call
his attention to the sign which he
has seen with unseeing eyes these
twenty years he explains that that is
of the past, and refers you to Smith
& Co., around on India square-they
| handle the whale-oil, | think" And
then Smith, the commission dealer,
says: 1--WE don't carry any whale-oil;
OH yes, there is an old fellow out in
! central New York that orders barrel
once every six months or SO. We or
der it for him from New Bedford, but
| we don't know what he does with it.
Some old Rip Van Winkle, l guess,
that sticks to the old ways"
After diligent search you find the
one or two houses that do make a
| business of whale products, and you
| learn that there is now just one staple
use for sperm oil-miners' lamps.
| Then, too, a few railroad companies
like it for their signal lamps, and for
| certain curious purposes, like temper
| ing steel, the universal mineral oil is
improved by a slight admixture of
| spermaceti.
| In New Bedford you will hear the
same story. In the grocery stores and
on sunny porches the old whaling
captains, deep-eyed, hawk-nosed, re-
hearsed old times in ''the Western
| ooaopD Tho y,iaturacrua nnpulation