250 HISTORY AND METHODS OF THE FISHERIES. 



harpooned tb rough the water to the machine. The boat was made 1! fret longer than usual to 

 make room for the apparatus. The harpoon was of the ordinary pattern, but so constructed that 

 the wooden pole might be easily detached with a small line. The harpoon was intended to be 

 darted by hand, ami when the pole was withdrawn the head and the conductor should remain in 

 the whale; then the machine should be set in motion and the electric current circulated through 

 the body of the whale. At each revolution of the machine handle it is claimed that the whale 

 receives about eight tremendous shocks, or 960 strokes per minute "so formidable a power that 

 no living being can resist the same." 



THE ORTHODOX AND CUSTOMARY METHODS OF CAPTURE. 



"FASTENING ON TO "WHALES." In considering the various methods and appliances that have 

 been employed from time to time in the capture of the whale, the primitive style, by means of the 

 harpoon, line, and band-lance, is of first importance. The next step was the introduction of the 

 harpoon-gun, which finally gave way to the bomb-gun and suggested the system now universally 

 employed of discharging explosives in the vital parts of the whale. But the initial step now taken 

 in the capture is identical with that of the early days of whaling, for the harpoon is still relied 

 upon to fasten the whale to the boat. The hand-lance, formerly the only instrument available in 

 giving the death blow, has been almost entirely superseded by the bomb-lance, and its discontinu- 

 ance is merely a question of time. An implement called the boat-spade was formerly used to 

 disable a running right whale by severing the tendons which connect the body and the flukes; 

 but, so far as its legitimate duty is concerned, it also has been virtually displaced by the explosive 

 lance. 



The practice of "fastening on to" whales is as old as the fishery. It was resorted to by the 

 Biscayans, from whom both the Dutch and English borrowed their ideas, and has been adopted 

 by all nations that have engaged in whaling. The Indians of Cape Flattery, the only representa- 

 tives of their race south of Alaska who capture the whale, first fasten on to the animal, and then 

 murder it with lances and other rude implements; and according to their traditions this method 

 of capture has been handed down through countless ages. As early as 1613, Purchas says', in an 

 account of "a hunting spectacle of the greatest chase wh'ch nature yieldeth," that the "harping 

 iron principally" serves "to fasten him to the shallop;" after which "they strike him with lances 

 made for that purpose, about 12 feet long." For over two hundred and fifty years this method of 

 capture has passed from generation to generation, and is rigidly practiced at the present writing. 

 Frederich Marten, ii; his account of a voyage to Spitsbergen in the ship " Jonas in the Whale" 

 (Jonas im Walfisch), during the year 1671, says, in his quaint style, that they fastened the long-boat 

 to the whale "that he might not run away." and then " launced" him until he was dead. 



THE HARPOON. The harpoon is of primary importance, for to this instrument the whalemen 

 look for success and profit. The primitive or typical harpoon, forms of which are still preserved, is 

 sagittate, and known to whalemen as the "two-fined iron;" the next step was the harpoon, with 

 one fixed barb, the "one-fined iron," and the third, the instrument now in use, with a movable 

 barb or toggle which acts upon the principle of the lily-iron of the sword fishermen. The lily- 

 iron, which was evidently suggested by the adjustable bone and ivory harpoon heads of the Eskimo 

 tribes, was used on whaling vessels for striking porpoises when "sea-pies" were needed, and for 

 other purposes, but it was not strong enough for whaling. Considerable complaint was lodged 

 against the, old harpoon (Vom the fact that oftentimes it would "draw" and let the whale escape, 

 and the urgent need of a new and better instrument became apparent daily. The "one-fined" 

 harpoon was introduced, being made with the diameter of the neck smaller than the shank, to 



