and whalers were dispatched to the Baltic for timber, or wherever else a freight could be procured, and others departed to strange ports, and returned no more; for they were sold. The whaling fleet became, therefore, small by degrees. Yet two ports struggled on against the receding tide; Hull in England, and Peterhead in Scotland, always hoped against hope, and persevered amid every disadvantage. They still sent vessels out; if not to catch whales, to be contented with seals. Peterhead reaped the reward of perseverance. We observe from a recent return, that out of the hundred thousand Seals captured in 1850, sixty-three thousand four hundred and twenty-six fell to the share of ten Peterhead vessels. There was something romantic about whale-fishing. When the captain, with his assisted eye, descried the far-off parabolic _spout_ of his victim, the cry of "_Fall! fall!_" would resound from stem to stern, and from hold to cross-trees. Down went the boats, sharp and graceful as regatta skiffs, and yet as strong and compact as herring yawls; the steerer took his oar, for rudders are too slow for this kind of navigation; the line-coiler, stood by his ropes; while last, and most important of all, the harpooner descended with his glittering instruments. Muffled oars dip in the waters, and the skiff nears the sleeping leviathan. A single awkward splash would rouse him; but all is silent as death, and the harpooner, poising himself, takes his deadly aim, and buries his javelin in the huge carcase. Smarting with pain, the enormous black mass lurches, and then with lightning speed darts underneath the wave; the boiling surge raised by its descent lifts the boat like a feather; the line attached to the harpoon disappears fathom after fathom, hissing around the rolling-pin, with a force and velocity that, but for copious libations, would cause ignition; a long and still extending streak of gore marks the route of the wounded animal; the rope at last goes less rapidly off, and as its rapidity decreases, they pull up to the victim, and insert more instruments, and then after a few deadly slaps with his tail, the monarch of the ocean yields up the contest.