THE WHALEBONE WHALES OF THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC. 29 



Coast. I have myself killed muuy of them. Their Females have ahundaiice of 

 Milk, which their young oues suck out of the Teats, that grow l)y their Navell. 

 They have no Teeth, but feed on Mosse, growing on the Rocks at the bottom 

 during these thi'ee Moneths, and at no other season of the Yeai-. When that is 

 consumed and gone, the Whales go away also. These we kill for tlieir Oyl. But 

 here have l:)een Sperma-Ceti-Whaks driven upon the slu)re, which Spertna (as 

 they call it) lies all over the Body of tliose Whales. These liave divers Teeth, 

 which may be about as big as a Man's wrist; and I hope by the next opi^rtunity 

 to send you one of them. I have been at the Bahama-Ulnmh, and there liave 

 been found of this same sort of Whales dead on the shoi'e, with Spenna all over 

 their Bodies. Myself with about 20 more have agreed to tr}', whether we can 

 master and kill them, for I could never hear of any of that sort, that were kill'd 

 by any man ; such is their fierceness and swiftness. One such Whale would be 

 worth niany hundi'ed pounds. They are very strong, and inlay'd with sinews all 

 over their Bod^^, which may be drawn out thiity fathom long." ' 



There are various statements regarding this fishery in the colonial records of 

 the Bermudas, a large body of which was published in convenient form by Sir J. 

 H. Lefroy in 1879.~ These include the papers of Norwood and Stafford already 

 quoted, but are chiefly orders of the proprietors of the islands to the successive 

 governors concerning the regulation of the fishery, reports of the governors to the 

 pi'oprietors, and various proclamations and court decisions relating to the conduct 

 of the industry. In these papers references ai'e occasionally made to the seasons 

 in which the whales appear at the islands, and some other allusions to their habits, 

 but very little is said regarding the whales themselves. 



While many complaints were made by the proprietors in London that whale 

 oil was not sent them as it should have been, whalebone is seldom referred to. 

 It is usually mentioned as something which might be expected to form a valuable 

 product of the industry, but never as a product actually in hand. Fj'om this it 

 would appear that to the close of the ITtli century at least, the Right whale 

 was not taken at the islands, for it is not probable that the valuable whalebone of 

 that species would have been ignoi'ed. 



We hear nothing of the Bermuda Hump back fi.sheiy again for a very long 

 time. Mr. J. Matthew Jones, of Nova Scotia, stated in 1884, that it was "prose- 

 cuted by the islanders witli more or less success from the earliest times until the 

 present." ^ He seems to be of the opini(jn, however, that the Right whale was the 

 species sought for, but there is very good reason to believe that the statements of 

 Norwood and Stafford, in 1667 and 1668, relate to the same whale as that mentioned 

 in the anonymous accounts of 1665, and the latter was undoubtedly the Hump- 

 back. Later, the Right whale may have been captured, as it was on the coast 

 of New England, and it is possible that at a comparatively early date attention 



' Stafford, Richard, An Extract of a Letter, written to the Pulilisher from the Bermudas by 

 Mr. Richard Stafford ; concerning the Tydes there, as also whales, Spiima Ccti, (etc.). Bermuda, 

 July i6, i668. P/iilos. Trans., 3, No. 40, 1668, pp. 792-794. 



" Lefroy, J. H., Memorials of the Discovery and Early Settlement of the Bermudas or Somers 

 Islands, 1511-1687. 2 vols., London, 1877-79. 



' Bii/l. U. S. Nat. Mus., No. 25, 1884, p. 148. 



