OFF SHORE 79 



the end of the war that he and his son Barnabas had Httle left 

 besides their real estate. 



In 1765 four sloops were whaling out of the little village of 

 Bedford. Between 1771 and 1775 some sixty, on an average, 

 were fitted out each year, and some of them went voyages to 

 the Falkland Islands. At that time sixty-five vessels were fitted 

 out every year at Nantucket, whose whole fleet in 1775 num- 

 bered 150, twenty at Wellfleet, fifteen at Boston, and twelve at 

 Martha's Vineyard. Four other Massachusetts ports, Fal- 

 mouth, Swanzey, Barnstable, and Lynn, were whaling in a 

 small way. 



Meanwhile, whaling had taken root in Rhode Island and 

 Connecticut, and the whaling from Long Island, which, as we 

 have noted, is generally accepted as preceding that from Cape 

 Cod, had survived the ups and downs of more than a century and 

 a quarter. 



In its earliest history. Long Island whaling closely resembled 

 the early whaling in the New England colonies, and ran through 

 the usual course: first, shore whaling, then ventures in small 

 craft, and then in larger. Southampton, Easthampton, 

 Southwood, Seatoocook, and Huntington appear prominently 

 as whaling ports, in the records of the times. But in its rela- 

 tion with the Government of New York, it has a less conven- 

 tional story. 



Heavy taxation by "the Governor and the Dutch," and the 

 threat to cut down the timber that the inhabitants of the island 

 needed in making oil casks, aroused the three towns first named, 

 to protest to the court at Whitehall in 1672; and that same 

 month Governor Francis Lovelace appointed two men to look 

 into irregular practices with regard to drift whales that came 

 ashore on Long Island. The Long Islanders sold their oil 

 through Boston and Connecticut towns, and this annoyed the 

 New York Government. 



In July, 1673, the Dutch regained control of New York and 

 held it for some sixteen months, which precipitated unforeseen 

 troubles upon the heads of the whalemen. In trade, the Dutch 

 and the English were keen rivals, and among the European 



