236 FOLLOW THE WHALE 



Whales were at first so numerous off the Tasmanian coast that 

 what was described as their "snoring" once kept the governor awake 

 in his residence by the shore of the Derwent Inlet, but the business 

 was so profitable that it soon became overcrowded, and as many as 

 twenty boats sometimes put off after one whale. The whales arrived 

 like clockwork toys on certain dates in June in Tasmania, and were 

 subsequently slaughtered wholesale. As the remnants moved over to 

 and along the Australian coasts, fleets of little boats waited for them 

 in almost every inhabited bay and inlet. The Tasmanian and Aus- 

 tralian aborigines made excellent whalemen and were consequently 

 exploited by the colonists just as thoroughly as were the North 

 American Amerindians by the Yankees. The bonanza could not last 

 under these pressures, and after a slow decline in their numbers, the 

 whales finally failed altogether to turn up in Tasmania in 1841. By 

 this time there were 300 American and some French whalers work- 

 ing the south coast of Australia alone, while many more of the 675- 

 strong Yankee fleet, which employed over 16,000 men, were in 

 adjacent seas both sperming and cutting into bay whaling. 



Meanwhile also, New Zealand had become an almost equally profit- 

 able hunting ground. The country was still the unclaimed domain of 

 its native Maori inhabitants, and while it offered outstanding oppor- 

 tunities for exploitation, nobody made any move to annex it. Sperm- 

 ing was already under way off the north coast of New Zealand in 

 1794, and the Bay of Islands became a rendezvous for these high- 

 seas men. Contacts were made with the Maori chiefs for fresh food 

 and other trade. The results were appalling. The rough whalers 

 cheated and mistreated the natives, who, being a magnificent warrior 

 race, replied in kind. They seized one ship, named the Boyd, and 

 killed and ate its entire complement, except one woman, a clubfooted 

 boy, and two small children. Nor was this an isolated event, for the 

 whalers persisted in interfering with the Maoris' bloodthirsty inter- 

 nal tribal wars while using them also in marauding among their own 

 European and American rivals. A vast amount of blood was shed, and 

 the whole state of affairs became so deplorable that the whalers 

 finally banded together against the Maoris in 18 10 and set up fully 

 defended camps and settlements along the coasts. 



The right whales migrated annually north, in May, to the New 

 Zealand coasts to calve. Passing Kapiti Island, they entered Cook 



