176 WHALE-FISHERY. 



near as convenient to the place where the copper was 

 erected. The copper hehl only half a ton. It was 

 furnished with a furnace and the requisite appen- 

 dages. A man, designated " tub-filler," with a ladle 

 of copper, was employed in filling a hogshead with 

 chopped blubber, dragging it to the copper, and emp- 

 tying it in, until the copper was full. A fire of wood 

 was in the first instance applied ; but after a copper 

 or two had been boiled, the fmlcs or flitters were 

 always sufficient to boil the remainder without any 

 other fuel. 



When the blubber was sufficiently boiled, two 

 men, called " copper-men," with two long-handled 

 copper ladles, took the oil and finks out of the cop- 

 per, and put it into a " fritter barrow," which, be- 

 ing furnished with a grating of wood in place of 

 a bottom, drained the oil from the fritters, from 

 whence it ran into a wooden tank or cooler of about 

 five tons capacity. Three coolers were usually pro- 

 vided, and placed some feet asunder, a little be- 

 low each other. A quantity of water was put into 

 each before the oil, and the oil, whenever it came 

 to a certain height in the first cooler, escaped 

 through a hole by a spout into the second, the 

 same way into the third, and from tlience by a 

 jilug-hole into the casks or butts in readiness for its 

 reception. AVhen the oil in these butts was tho- 

 roughly cold, whatever it had contracted was filled 



