The ice conditions encountered by the Scotch whalers, are a nearly solid expanse of one season’s ice in Melville Bay, and when that is passed, heavy ice in narrow land-locked channels, notorious for their strong currents, the direction of which is opposed to the course of the whalers. It has been said by one writer that the American whalers use their steam to keep out of the ice, while the Scotch use theirs to get into and through it. Comparing existing ships of the Scotch, Norwegian, and United States whaling fleets, it is found that the following average proportions of beam to length exist: Scotch, 1:5.75 Norwegian, 1:4.7 American, 1:4.5 It is seen at once that the Norwegians and Americans have not departed from the old-fashioned sailing ship model. (The average ratio in our modern Bath-built schooners is 1:4.78.) The Scotchmen have a finer model, and since this model is a practical evolution by shrewd seamen and builders from an experience of over one hundred and twenty-five years, in a business where large financial returns were the lot of the best ship; and the seas where that experience was secured and for which that evolution was designed, are the seas to be navigated by the proposed ship, it seemed clear that the Scotch model was the one on which to base our studies. The problem of size did not present itself in the present instance in quite the form that it did to Nansen, and the English and German Antarctic Expeditions. In these instances the size of the party and the length of time it was to be absent being determined upon, and the coal consumption of the engines fixed, it was easy to calculate the cargo to be carried which, plus the dead weight of the ship and machinery, gave at once the displacement needed. In the present case it was regarded as practicable to determine in advance upon a size and proportion of ship which should most nearly balance and meet the various requirements, and let the difference between her displacement, and her own dead weight, go for cargo capacity, of which the greater portion would be coal. The size fixed upon was 184 feet over all by 35 feet beam by 16 feet draft, loaded. (Load water-line 166 feet.) This gives a ship of nearly the same length, but a little greater beam than the English Antarctic ship, _Discovery_. Her length ratio would be 1:5.26, not quite as fine as the Scotch average, but much finer than the Norwegian or American models. Such a ship is in the same class as the _Terra Nova_, _Bear_, _Thetis_, and _Neptune_ of existing whalers, the _Proteus_ (lost), and the exploring ship _Discovery_.