THE PRESENT SURVIVAL OF OPEN BOAT WHALING 3 , 9 



head is carefully cleaned of rust. The socket of the iron is then completely served with spunyarn or 

 marlin. This helps to jam the iron-strap and prevent it chafing. The iron-strap is a length of hemp 

 rope as used for the whaleline: it was manilla fibre in the late American fishery. The strap is fastened 

 tightly to the shank of the iron by a round turn and eyesplice, so that, when the strap takes the strain 

 of the towing whale, the fastening holds by jamming against the swelling of the socket. The fastening 



Table 7. The hand harpoon and lance. Measurements of mounted craft 

 presented by Rets e Martins Lda. in 1949 



is called ' the hitches ' and the way of making it was traditional in the American fishery. Other fastenings 

 than the round turn and eyesplice have sometimes been employed for the hitches in' New England 

 whaling in its earlier days (Ashley, 1948, p. 334), but they are not known in the Azores. The pole of the 

 harpoon is a length of local wood about 6 ft. long and 2^-3 in. in section, well chamfered at the edges, 

 and roughly tapered from a more or less square butt to an increasingly cylindrical form and a some- 

 what smaller section at the socket end. American poles were traditionally of hickory with the bark 

 still on. The socket end is skilfully tapered with an adze and the iron fitted over it and jammed with 



y 



