Note 68 — THE MERMAID.
Reading edition
Almost all that is known of the living rytina is from an account published in 1751, in St. Petersburg, by Steller, who was one of an exploring party wrecked on Behring's Island in 1741. During the ten months the crew remained on the island they pursued this easily-captured animal so persistently, for food, that it was all but annihilated at the time. The last one there was killed in 1768.