HISTORY AND DETAILS OF WHALING. 283 



therefore, with others, suffers a common loss. Worthy young 

 men experience such instances of misfortune as these ; having 

 made little or nothing during their absence from home, they 

 are induced, from a sense of mortified pride, perhaps, to re- 

 main away years longer, hoping thereby to gain during the 

 next voyage what they failed to secure in the last one. Thus 

 they ship again, and go through nearly the same routine, the 

 second time, as they did the first ; with this exception, how- 

 ever, if they have given proof of efficiency and aptitude in 

 whaling, they will be promoted to the position of boat steerers, 

 and even to higher offices. 



The writer on one occasion conversed with a young man, on 

 board of one of our outward bound whale ships, respecting 

 his parents, the place of his nativity, how long he had been in 

 the whaling business, when he left home, &c. He informed 

 the writer that he had a widowed mother in an adjoining 

 state; that he returned from sea in June last, and having 

 made nothing, he was therefore unable to go home and see his 

 mother. Soon after his arrival in New Bedford he shipped 

 again, and is now on another cruise of three and a half years. 

 When allusion was made to his mother, and that in some way 

 he ought to have gone and seen her, the tear instantly gath- 

 ered in his eye, which showed that beneath a weather-beaten 

 exterior there was something in his bosom which quickly re- 

 sponded to the endearing name — mother. 



The system of outfitting, to which allusion has been made, 

 and which might be carried on with honesty and integrity, yet 

 nevertheless, as all must see, furnishes an opportunity for 

 the unprincipled and avaricious to defraud and grossly cheat 

 the ignorant and unsuspecting. The following are the ways 

 in which it may be done. 1. In the poor and miserable quality 

 of cloth of which seamen's garments are made. They have been 

 known to fail to pieces after being worn only a few times, 

 which clearly proved that the material called cloth was just 

 strong enough to be put into the shape of clothes, and that was 



