HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN WHALE FISHERY. 33 



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whaleiiieu had killed but one large wbale duriug the season ; the bone 

 of that oue was from 8 to 9 feet long. 



^Nor was the whaling-season of 1738-9 any more successful to the in- 

 habitants of the cape. Up to the 15tb of February, 1739 — the whaling- 

 season being then over — there had been taken at Provincetown but six 

 small and one large whale, and at Sandwich two more small ones. This 

 was the extent of the catch.* As a result of two successive poor sea- 

 sons, many of the people of Provincetown were in straitened oircum- 

 stauces and much distressed. Those depending upon the early spring 

 whaling "returned as they went, only more in debt." Many of them 

 were without money or provisions.! 



Early in 1741 the French and Spanish privateers commenced their 

 depredations upon the English commerce. Naturally our whaling- ves- 

 sels came in for their proportion of loss. In May a Spanish privateer, 

 under Don. Francisco Lewis, captured a whaling-vessel from Barnstable, 

 commanded by Capt. Solomon Sturgis, "dismissed the captain and eight 

 Hands, carried away the Sloop and four Hands, and put in John Davis, 

 Mate of said Sloop."f The seasons still continued unfavorable for the 

 coast-whaling on the cape,§ but late in the summer and during the 

 early fall of 1711 the inhabitants of that section were cheered by an un- 

 expected success. Great numbers of porpoises and black fish came 

 swarming into the bay, and the hardy fishermen lost no time in attack- 

 ing them. By the close of October they had killed 150 porpoises and 

 over 1,000 black fish, yielding them about 1,500 barrels of oil, for the 

 most of which they found an immediate sale. '^This unexpected Success 

 so late in the Year, put new Life into Some who had spent all the former 

 Season of the Year in Toil and Labour to little or no Purpose.''|| 



The presence of privateers on the coast appears to have entirely pre- 

 vented the prosecution of the Davis Strait whaling, for no departures to or 

 arrivalsfrom that region are reported ibr several years. Whalemen were 

 liable to be overhauled anywhere, but it is to be presumed that the risk 

 became greater as the distance from port increased. Occasionally these 

 privateers would swoop down through Nantucket and Vineyard Sounds 



* Ibid., February 15. 



i Ibid., April 5. 



Xlbid. The issue of the News-Letter for July 23, 1741, says: "Truro, July 14. Ou 

 Saturday last Mr. Nath Harding an elderly Man of this Place, being at one of the Fry 

 Houses boiling of Oil, he was taken with a fainting Fit, and fell into a large Vessell of 

 boiling hot Oyl, and was scalded in a most miserable Manner." 



§ Whales formerly, for many successive years, set in along shore by Cape Cod. There 

 was good whaling in boats. Proper watchmen ashore, by signals, gave notice when a 

 whale appeared. After some years they left this ground, and passed farther otf upon 

 the banks at some distance from the shore. The whalers then used sloops with whale- 

 boats aboard, and this fishery turned to good accouut. At present (1748) the whales 

 take their course in deep water, where upon a peace our whalers design to follow 

 them. * * * * At present this business is by whaling sloops or schooners, with 

 two whale-boats and 13 men." — (Felt, Salem, ii, 225-6.) 



|l Boston News-Letter, 

 3 



