THE HISTORY OF DUTCH SEA FISHERIES. 129 



rights in the Northern seas, which will be treated of in 

 another chapter, caused the Dutch whalers some uneasiness. 

 A few of their vessels were actually taken by the Danes, 

 and they had for some years to sail under convoy by 

 Government men-of-war. Still these events did not 

 materially affect the trade ; for the number of ships 

 sailed to Greenland, which were especially the object of 

 Denmark's animosity, was much greater in the years 

 1739-1748 than in the preceding decade. In 1747, the 

 Republic's war with France having necessitated extra- 

 ordinary measures to get crews for the squadrons, a general 

 obligation to give up one third of the crews to the Admi- 

 ralties, or redeem them at the price of 40 florins per head, 

 was once more laid upon merchant vessels in general ; but 

 the Greenland and Davis' Straits fisheries were expressly 

 exempted from either charge, by a Resolution of the States- 

 General, dated December 1st*. The favour was partly 

 cancelled on February iQth of the next year, when the 

 States-General resolved to allow the trade two men-of-war 

 as conveyers without the retribution they had hitherto paid 

 for them to the Admiralties, provided each whaling vessel 

 should furnish five able seamen, or the whole fleet together 

 should furnish five hundred such seamen to the Admiralties 

 of the Maas and Amsterdam!. In other words, the 

 whalers were to have convoying vessels without paying for 

 them, but on condition that they should man them out of 

 their own crews ; for the men-of-war offered by the States 

 were to carry forty guns and two hundred and fifty men 

 each. 



Besides these measures in their behalf, whaling ships were 

 in 1750, upon the request of the Commission of Greenland 



* Gr. PI. Boek,v\\. 515. 

 t Ibid. p. 1591. 



