Midday North and South 237 



Strait and congregated in Cloudy Bay. In June they moved to the 

 Chatham Islands. In October they went off north or east. About 

 1828 the number of sperms in surrounding seas began to decline, 

 and the slaughter of the right whales then really started in earnest. 

 Ships came from Sydney and other Australian ports, landed a gang 

 who set up a try-works ashore, and went on up the coast to collect 

 a cargo of flax. Then they sailed for Australia and returned after 

 the whaling season to pick up their shore party and whale products. 



These shore stations were little different from the more perma- 

 nent settlements in Tasmania and Australia. Small boats put off 

 daily after the whales, towed them ashore from distances of as many 

 as three miles if the weather was good, or anchored them offshore 

 if it was bad. The oil extracted at these works commanded a much 

 better price than that from the Greenland fishery because it was 

 fresh when tryed-out and not extracted from rotten blubber that 

 had been stashed in barrels in a ship's hold for months. From two to 

 thirteen tons of oil were obtained from a single whale, and the 

 average ran over six tons. The business was highly profitable in it- 

 self, but there was, in addition, a brisk trade with the Maoris. Every 

 whaler brought a cargo full of guns, rum, tobacco, blankets, knives, 

 pipes, fishhooks, and so forth, to exchange for flax, Uve pigs, pota- 

 toes, and curios. 



The New Zealand bay whaling was almost exclusively in the hands 

 of the Australians at first. The British and Americans — that is to 

 say, the deep-sea men, the spermers, and the English ships that came 

 to the Pacific round the Horn — did not take any active part until 

 about 1835. Meanwhile, the relations between the Maoris and the 

 whalers had become so violent that the British Government was 

 bombarded with requests to intervene. Even the cannibal chief, Te 

 Rauparaha, appealed for missionaries to be sent to help him, and the 

 first arrived in 1836. The whole country was formally declared a 

 territory of New South Wales, Australia, in 1839 and a lieutenant 

 governor was appointed to examine all land claims. He arrived in 

 New Zealand the following year and signed a treaty at Waitangi 

 with forty-six of the leading chiefs, although that same year a com- 

 pany in Sydney actually bought the whole South Island and part of 

 the North Island for two hundred pounds, plus an annuity of one 

 hundred pounds to another group of chiefs. This private land-grab 



