76 The Story of the New England Whalers 



levied a tax of 100, though the tax roll did not 

 mention the purpose for which it was to be used, 

 the Quakers saw that it would be given to a Puri- 

 tan minister and refused to pay it. It was not a 

 matter of money with them. They at once raised 

 700 with which they prosecuted an appeal to the 

 home authorities, before whom they won. 



It was this band of stiff-necked religious inde- 

 pendents that established the whale fishery at 

 New Bedford. One may suppose that the bull- 

 dog persistence of the Quaker in his fights for 

 principle was at the foundation of his success in 

 the whale fishery. A friend of the sect might go 

 farther, perhaps, and say that while the standards 

 of right and wrong of those days differed widely 

 from the modern, yet even then the Friends chose 

 whaling rather than the slave trade, and coast- 

 wise smuggling. And since they could not in 

 good conscience sail on either a naval ship or a 

 privateer, their innate love of a good fight had 

 to find vent somewhere, and the whale fishery 

 proved the most exciting resource. 



The first settler on the territory now occupied 

 by New Bedford was named Joseph Russell. 



