432 HISTORY AND METHODS OF THE FISHERIES. 



with the salt in time for the pupping season. You know when the pupping season comes on, 

 and can calculate the time it will take you, but be sure and make plenty of allowance for bad 

 weather. 



" I should first go to Port Chalmers. I have been informed that a vessel leaves there for Eng- 

 land once a month. If such is the case it would be the best place for many reasons for you to go 

 to ship your skins and get salt. First, it is so near your work that there will be plenty of time for 

 you to write the owners so they can get the skins insured here or in England. 



" If I got out there early and saw a great show of seals, I should get as many on board as I 

 could without running any risk of not getting back in time. I would leave on the rocks all the 

 men that I thought would blab ; go to the most convenient port, ship my skins, get what I needed 

 and go back to the rocks, and finish up the season and go to Valparaiso without touching at 

 New Zealand, and I should expect to have another season without company. 



"You will remember that you cannot get all the seal from a rookery iu one season. If you get 

 3,000 the first season you may expect to get 1,000 or more the next, and in the same proportion 

 for a large or smaller number. If I went to Valparaiso I should write the agent in London, which 

 the owners had directed me to ship to on their account, one steamer before I sent the skins, so that 

 they could insure them, and then I should write them that I had shipped so many prime skins, all 

 in good order, taken in a high southern latitude, of course not mentioning the place. They class 

 skins differently from what we do, calling clapmatches ' middlings ', three-year old seal ' large 

 pups', two years old 'smalls', and yearlings 'small pups', which is all set forth in their catalogue, 

 one of which I will furnish you for future use. , 



" I have been in the habit of landing a boat with the men if there was any outstanding rocks 

 with seal on them, so that the men in good weather could go and work them off. I think you will 

 find on the Bounty Rocks seal on more than one of them ; also, you will find the Western Rock 

 the largest, as in most cases the groups of small islands and rocks in high southern latitudes are 

 found so. If the weather rocks have the best show of seals of coarse you will land your men on 

 them, and if the smaller rocks to leeward have any seal, they will be more easy to work by boats 

 in good weather, from being somewhat protected by the rocks to the westward. I think dories will 

 be the best boats to use at the Bounties, they are so easy to launch or haul up. I shall favor your 

 having at least two dories, but the men must be careful to haul them high up above any marks 

 of the sea, and turn and lash them in the most sheltered place or they will lose them. 



" Be sure and warn the men to pitch their tents in as high and sheltered a place as possible; 

 also to store the salt, and salt the skins higher up than seems really necessary. I make these re- 

 marks because I once worked a rock two seasons. The first season we stored the salt and salted 

 the skins in a cave high up, and, as we thought, safe from the sea. All through that season the 

 weather was as bad as we had in any season, but no sea came near the place. In the short time 

 that the men were away there came a sea just right to wash over that part of the rock, and 

 washed the cave out clean, loose rocks and all, so we took the hint the next season and salted 

 higher up. 



" I should make and have on hand, besides the tent coverings, a good lot of tarpaulins, large 

 enough to make a tent for two or three men and their traps. They will never come amiss, for they 

 are handy to cover up salt and skins on the rocks. I think you will find it necessary at the Bounties 

 to land two or three men at a time on the outlying rocks to work them off. Great care should be 

 taken in approaching an unknown island or group of rocks. During a strong wind and extra 

 heavy swell is a good time to go for them. In such a time, by keeping a good lookout the hidden 

 dangers will be very apt to be seen. 



