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SMEERENBERG. 



MRS. F. 



When the Europeans first began to prosecute the fishery 

 on the west of Spitzbergen, whales were found every where 

 in great numbers; and, ignorant of the strength and stratagems 

 of the formidable foe who assailed them, instead of betraying 

 any symptoms of fear, the whales surrounded the ships and 

 crowded all the bays. Their capture was, in consequence, a 

 comparatively easy task, and many were killed which it was 

 afterwards found necessary to abandon, from the ships being 

 already full. 



HENRIETTA. 



I suppose that a vessel cannot contain many of these huge 

 animals. 



MRS. F. 



In the returns of the fishery, I do not see that they ever 

 bring home above eight or ten; but whether a vessel would 

 hold more I cannot say. However, at the period of which I 

 am speaking, the whales being thus easily obtained, it was 

 the practice to bring home only the oil and the whalebone, 

 and to boil the blubber on shore in the north. Perhaps, 

 nothing can give a more vivid idea of the extent and import- 

 ance of the Dutch fishery in the middle of the seventeenth 

 century, than the fact that they constructed a considerable 

 village, the houses of which were all previously prepared in 

 Holland, on the isle of Amsterdam, to which they gave the 

 appropriate name of Smeerenberg. 



ESTHER. 

 What is the derivation of the name! 



From smeeren to melt, and berg, a mountain. This village 

 was the grand rendezvous of the Dutch whale ships, and was 

 amply provided with boilers, tanks, and every sort of appa- 

 ratus required for preparing the oil and the bone. Nor was 

 this all; the whale ships were attended by a number of pro- 



