Harpoons, Lances, Guns, and Boats 209 



cicatrized, and perhaps after many years, by 

 attrition, the projecting shank may be worn to 

 a mere shred. A boat steerer belonging to the 

 Ansel Gibbsy of New Bedford, threw his harpoon 

 into a bowhead whale in Hudson Bay, and sev- 

 eral years afterwards the Cornelius Howland, of 

 New Bedford, captured the same whale in the 

 Arctic regions on the western coast. The whale 

 had traversed the great northwest passage, which 

 is yet unknown to man, and carried with it the 

 harpoon, which was branded with the names 

 of the Gibbs and of the blacksmith [Jireh Swift] 

 who made it." (James Templeman Brown, in 

 The Whale Fishery.) 



All the harpoons belonging to every whale 

 ship were marked with names, letters, lines, 

 dots, etc., made with a cold chisel in such a way 

 that any one finding a harpoon in a whale could 

 tell not only what ship it was from, but also the 

 boat from which it was thrown. This was done 

 because of the whaler's rule of the chase which 

 said that "marked craft claims the fish, so long 

 as it is in the water, dead or alive." 



The Whale Fishery says that "the books of 



