14 THE WHALEBONE WHALES OF THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC. 



winter in their parts, they sailed westward, and in 1372 reached the banks of 

 Newfoundland, where they observed whales in abundance." ' 



No authorities are cited by Fischer, and similar statements by other authors 

 prove elusive. Justin Winsor summed up the evidence on this point in 1894 in the 

 following language : 



"We need not confidently trust the professions of Michel and other advocates 

 of the Basques, and believe that a century before Cabot their hardy fishermen dis- 

 covered the banks of Newfoundland, and had even penetrated into the bays and 

 inlets of the adjacent coasts. There seems, however, little doubt that very early in 

 the sixteenth century fishing equipments for these regions were made by the Nor- 

 mans, as Breard chronicles them in his Documents relatifs a la Normand."'" 



Of post-Columbian explorers of Newfoundland and the St. Lawrence, the first 

 to make mention of large whales is Cartier. Indeed, the allusions to cetaceans in 

 his narrative of his second voyage to Canada appear to constitute the first authentic 

 notice of whalebone whales on the east coast of North America. Cartier left 

 St. Malo on his second voyage, May 19, 1535, and in July entered the Gulf of St. 

 Lawrence. Soon afterwards he passed westward and proceeded to explore the 

 St. Lawrence River. In his narrative of the journey we find the following : 



[1535. CARTIER'S SECOND VOYAGE.] 



" The said river [the St. Lawrence] beginneth beyond the Island of the Assump- 

 tion, over against the high mountains of Hognedo, and of the seven islands : the 

 distance over from one side to the other is about 35 or 40 leagues : in the midst it 

 is above 200 fathom deep. The surest way to sail upon it is upon the south side; 

 and toward the north, that is to say, from the said seven islands, from side to side 

 there is seven leagues distance, where are also two great rivers that come down 

 from the hills of Saguenay, and make divers very dangerous shelves in the sea. 



"At the entrance of those two rivers, we saw many a great store of whales 

 and sea-horses." 3 



Exactly where these two rivers are is uncertain, but early maps show the 

 'Land of the Seven Islands" to be on the north shore of the St. Lawrence, near 

 its mouth. The whales mentioned were most probably whalebone whales, as 

 mention is made soon afterwards of porpoises and the Beluga, thus: 



"All the said country on both sides the [St. Lawrence] river, as far as Hochelay 

 and beyond, is as fair and plain as ever was seen. . . . There are also many 

 whales, porpoises, sea-horses, and adhothuis [Beluga], which is a kind of fish that 

 we had never seen nor heard of before. 



'FISCHER, P., Documents pour servir a 1'Histoire de la Baleine des Basques (Balcena bis- 

 cayensis). Annal. Sci. Nat., Zool., 15, 1872, art. 3, p. 15. 



Van Beneden repeats the statement in his Hist. Nat. des Cetaces des Mers d'Europe, 1889, p. 25. 



'WINSOR, JUSTIN, Cartier to Frontenac, 1894, pp. 9-10. 



' Narration of the Navigation to the Islands of Canada, etc. Pinkerton's Voyages, 12, p. 657. 

 Cartier's Voyage, 1535. From Hakluyt, 3, p. 212. 



