Show O t fi r re t e 5 M a aw w t tr r Inflated Moby Dicks In Tow Prepared ar d b h by tho the National Geographic Society Washington D C C. IlY did did- Norway make malte a n W WHY counter claim with Denmark Denmark- over a segment of the th east st coast const of of Greenland a land once Inhabited In habited by Eskimos but now barren and Ice lee choked most of the year Perhaps the Norwegians seek seck to e ex extend extend ex- ex tend their fisheries for a large part of Norway's population lives on the tie generosity of King Neptune Only a little more than 3 per cent of Norway Is under cultivation The country lacks the chief prerequisite of modern the Industrialism the juxtaposition Juxtaposition Juxta juxta- position of Iron and coal The Norwegians Nor striving to the utmost cannot cannot can can- not eke out a n living lh-Ing from the soil They Import much food fond Nor can they depend depel I. I as toes does England upon the exchange of the products of their factories for the products ts of other peoples people's pe farms En Even the skies frown often upon I Norway The w west st coast for a good part of the year Is shrouded by a apall apall pall of mist fog and drizzle with OO days of rain out of the year The annual rainfall at tit Bergen Is Ismore ismore ismore more than six feet reet The country Is traversed by a great dorsal plateau standing stark and high e abo sea sen level In these rocky y sterile soils useful plant life will not take e root A great wall of m mountains known as ns the Keel heel defines the Swedish frontier Southernmost Norway Is In the same latitude as ns northern Labrador with northernmost N Norway I lying ing far within the Arctic circle Norway Norway Nor Nor- way Is hardly more than a fringe or shelf washed by the Arctic and the North Atlantic oceans and deeply deeply deep deep- ly Iy Indented b by salt water Island canals known as ns fjords For the most part agriculture is limited to nooks and corners orners Little farms cling to the base of mountains like shipwrecked ed sailors to a life Ufe raft sixty per cent of Norway's s farms are less than five acres OS DS per cent centre re e less tl than in 25 acres Norway se seems ms to be one of ot otna natures nature's natures nature's natures nature's na na- tures ture's climatic mistakes T Too o much daylight dalIght in summer In-summer summer too little In winter too much worthless water here too much sterile mountain there But nut what hat the country may maylack maylack lack In quality Is Is' more than offset by the quality of t the people who inhabit It Norwegians are happier than the common common run run run- of mortals They are essentially lly open air op open air country country country coun coun- try people knowing nothing of the misery and abject poverty of ot city slums and and- tenements They have e learned to to live comfortably with themselves having a n wealth of Inner In ner net resources resources resources' on oD which to draw They go down to the sea In ships and see the earth and the fullness thereof Before them lies the pa pano no rama rams of mountains glaciers cloud racks floating through the lofty defiles defiles demes de de- de- de files mes of their fjords They know the world too from the Inside of books booles They are are a bookish people prizing education Illiterates are about as plentiful In Norway 1 as ns horned toads on Boston common When it comes to exchange exchange ex ex- ex change of Intelligence Norway has more telephones than Spain or Poland with populations from seven seven sev sew sewen en to ten times as ns great Its Face Faco and Character Each country like each human being on this planet has hns a n face and character of Its own Chile another another an nn- other elongated mountainous coast const country fronting the west western rn sea In tn a n considerable area of Its Us homeland homeland homeland home- home land Is parched and rainless while Norway Is drenched with moisture Greece and Italy suffer from too much sun while Norway hasn't enough to go around Greece Albania Al Al- bania Portugal and Norway Nor Nor- Norway way are the only European coun coun- countries countries tries which grow no sugar beets beets- too much muco sun In the Mediterranean countries too little In Norway Contrast Contrast Contrast Con Con- the loiterers basking In the winters winter's winters winter's sunshine on the steps of the dl Spagna Rome with the N Norwegians ians clad In furs and arid oil oilskins skins adventuring d over o cold gray fog fog covered covered waters Italy grid and Norway Norway Nor Nor- way from early antiquity bred arace a n arace race ruce of sea rovers rovers nd adventurers dis ms- coverers Norway and Greece looking seaward sea sea- ward present the appearance of once compact lands that have hn been beeD shot to pieces by titanic sub sub- explosions Their deeply OP coasts are fringed and t ins as g. g with Island groups The sea Ben IB Is sown thick with fragments like celestial star dust In the tile Milky I Way The islands of Greece furnish goats currants and and material for r poetic rhapsodizing The Norwegian coast Is an exaggerated exaggerated southern Alaskan coast Skippers navigate na big ships through Norwegian fjords Just as ns they do through the deep-cut deep Alaskan Inner Inner In In- inner ner canals The fjords whether the result of ot glacial erosion or faulting of the earths earth's crust are are of ot considerable human utility Saved by Gulf Stream The warm Atlantic drift from the Gulf stream supplies Norway with both climate and fish But nut for this benefi beneficence ence of nature Norway w would Uld be a bleak and Inhospitable waste and most of the Norwegians would be compelled to emigrate or starve Fish following family tradition crowd Into the shoal waters of the North sea sea to to feed and breed i They've been doing It for thou thousands of years and the they'll 11 probably keep on just so long as this poor earths earth's s pale history runs They return like the swallows In the spring I nou speaking Norway has hag three strings s to Its fishing bow cod whale and herring but the herring her her- ring Is king 1 Herring because of their abundance ance give gl rise to the greatest of the oll worlds world's s 's fisheries They are as gregarious as the starlings starlings starlings star star- lings which cluster by night In the tops of trees on Pennsylvania Pennsyl avenue ave ave- avenue a venue ve- ve nue Washington They run In Immense immense Im im- mense schools with some of pf their life c cycle cle still shrouded In obscurity obscurity rity rHy although It Is probably as well known as that of any other Important important tant fish Norwegian herring fisheries herles fi were famous before William the Conquer Conquer- or The Norwegian fish Osh catch runs to about one and three three quarter quarter e-quarter billion bil lion pounds of which approximate approximate- approximately ly Iy one billion pounds are contrI contributed ut ed b by the herring tribe The live herring Is something of a n traveler but the dead herring goes farther What one ma may call all a pickled her belt bea ring ring-ra sour ring cream w Includes a better part of eastern Germany Poland the three Baltic three Baltic states Finland and Russia Development of Fisheries Norwegian fisheries have developed developed developed de de- from small beginnings when little wood wooden ri boats put out a 8 amile amile mile or two from the sh shore fe serab b bling for a meager menger catch of herring Now great steel power boats make catches of barrels of fish fish ina in fn a n d day y Once O-nce estimated d b by the pound the catch Is now estimated by the ton Norway has come largely to control control con con- the worlds world's whaling Industry once a great American business with Yankee ships sailing from New v England ports About the turn ol of the century It looked as If f the whal what ing lag business the world over O was wag doomed to early Dearly ry extinction De- De Defenseless Defenseless Defenseless De De- monsters monster's the poor whales do not get an even een break breal I Nature Ironically dooms them by causing them to signal their tl own tion If It whales were equipped tc to remain beneath the surface even as long as ns the modern submarine they would be more than a match for the rhe energetic Norwegians with their big steel ships and range long harpoon guns Norway's annual production of 01 whale oil rose from pounds In mO 1106 to pounds in 1027 1927 The Norwegian annual herring her her- ring ca catch would load a a. solid train of steel gondola cars reaching from New York to Philadelphia or If tf converted con to Norwegian cars a Q solid train miles long It would I require at least double these train lengths to handle the annual catch of or whales The Norwegians are the northernmost northern northernmost most and the s southernmost workers of the world Their operations co cover cor r a wider range than the nIght flight of the Arctic tern Annually 1000 Norwegians work In Antarctic E seas close mi uli to the great ice barrier Just as nB many work In the Arctic seas sea on the outskirts of the polar cap Norway's climatic eccentricities eccentricities' bear an Intimate relation to Norwegian Norwegian Norwegian Nor Nor- agriculture In Cn Norway farming funning within the Arctic circle Isby Is Isby Isby by no means a n desperate enterprise I As the snows VA retire vegetation Is ts quickened by long days of sunlight Even en dairy farming arming prospers withIn with with- In the Arctic circle despite the accepted ac notion that only reindeer thrive In those latitudes |