continued to fight without
bringing about a serious battle, and the whaling and sealing industry
continued to grow in such fashion as is here indicated. What it had
become little more than a generation later is shown in the remainder
of this article, mentioning incidentally that an American whaler, the
_Topaz_, Captain Folger, was the first discoverer of the descendants
of the _Bounty_ mutineers on Pitcairn Island in 1808; and that Wilkes'
United States Exploring Expedition of 1836-42 was in a large measure
suggested to America by the great increase in that half of the century
of American South Sea trade. What this increase was can best be told in
the words of the man--Mr. Charles Enderby--who was unquestionably the
highest authority and whose house founded this very industry in the
Southern Ocean. In April, 1849, Charles Enderby received a charter of
incorporation for a proposed southern whale fishery, together with
a grant of the Auckland Islands (but that is another story), and
to celebrate the occasion a banquet was held at the London Tavern,
Bishops-gate Street, London, presided over by the senior naval Lord
of the Admiralty, who proposed the health of the guest of the evening,
Charles Enderby. In replying to that toast Mr. Enderby quoted the
whalemen's shipping list, in which it was shown that in March, 1849,
"the United States, whose flag was to be found on every sea, had 596
whale-ships of 190,000 tons, and manned by 18,000 seamen, while the
number of English ships engaged in the whale trade was only fourteen!"

During the next decade the English did something to improve this state
of affairs, but their endeavour was made too late, and by the time they
woke up to the situation the heyday of South Sea whaling was gone.

We are so accustomed to take it for granted that the English (the
original brand thereof, not the American pattern) were fifty years ago
in command of all sea commerce, that the old-fashioned English sailor
was superior to all others, and that his ships beat every one else's in
everything appertaining to the sea, that this fact of how thoroughly the
Americans beat us in the great whaling industry is never remembered.
And whaling was and is now a branch of sea service that needs _men_ to
successfully work in it, for it cannot be profitably pursued with the
human paint-scrubbers who to-day make up such a large section of our
mercantile marine; and the success of the American whaling seamen
may sup