FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. [6] 



2.— THE WHALEBOAT. 



American whaleboats have smooth bottoms, battened seams, logger- 

 head aft, five thwarts, and invariably mast, mainsail, and jib. The 

 lengths vary from twenty-eight to twenty-nine or thirty-feet. The term 

 " craft" includes the harpoons, lances, boat-spade and boat-hook, but is 

 oftentimes more specifically applied to the implements used to strike and 

 kill the whale. " Boat- gear " comprehensively includes the entire outfit 

 of the boat, but more particularly refers to the implements other than 

 craft, such as the boat-bucket, piggin, water-bucket, line-tubs, lantern- 

 keg, oars, paddles, and the like. It also includes the warps, but in this 

 classification I shall mention them separately, as the main- warp or whale- 

 line, lance- warps, short- warj) and the boat- warp. 



A boat's crew consists of six men ; the officer of the boat, who is one 

 of the mates, with the title of " boat-header"; the harpooner, a petty 

 officer whose rank is next to that of a mate, known as ''boat-steerer;" 

 and five oarsmen. The boat-steerer strikes the whale, and the officer 

 usually kills it. The oarsmen have their appointed places in the boat, 

 and their respective duties to perform as whalemen. 



3.— HAEPOONS, GUNS, AND LANCES. 



The implements used in the capture, pre-eminently the most impor- 

 tant, are arranged upon the faces of four screens with maroon back- 

 grounds, and, as far as possible, the serial and chronological order has 

 been preserved. The first screen contains forty-seven hand-hari)oons, 

 among which may be found the forms used by the Basque, Dutch, Eng- 

 lish, French, and American fishermen, as well as a full series of the 

 various types introduced from time to time by Americans. The second 

 screen contains the primitive and modern types of the whaling guns, 

 the English swivel gun, and the rocket-gun — seventeen objects in all. 

 Upon the third screen the numerous patterns of the gun-harpoons are 

 arranged, comprising thirty-three objects. The fourth screen is devoted 

 to the explosive and non-exi)losive lances, the explosive harpoons, the 

 rocket-bomb, seal, sea-elephant, and walrus harpoons, comprising thirty- 

 eight implements. 



These four screens may be compared to four volumes — each imple- 

 ment constituting a chapter — containing an exhaustive treatise on the 

 past and present methods of the capture of the whale adopted by all 

 nations that have participated in this fishery. The chapters, though 

 comiDlete in themselves, are subordinate, the subjects of the one being 

 merely an introduction to the other, and may be used as stepping-stones 

 as we proceed from the beginning of the seventeenth century to the 

 present time. 



HAND-HARPOONS. 



The harpoons thrust by hand for striking whales may be divided into 

 four classes: (1) the typical harpoon; (2) the common toggle-iron, and 



