Was not an Austrian exploring expedition, interrupted as it was about to take possession of land in the Antarctic in the name of Austria by encountering an American whaler, trim and trig, lying placidly at anchor in a harbor where the Austrian thought no man had ever been?
It built up towns in New England that half a century of lethargy has been unable to kill.

And so if its brigs--and its men--now molder, if its records are scanty and its history unwritten, still Americans must ever regard the whale fishery as one of the chief factors in the building of the nation--one of the most admirable chapters in our national story..