XII THE BASQUE WHALE FISHERY 173 



together. The earliest known regular whale fishery- 

 had for quarry a race of whales now absolutely 

 destroyed, which were found at no great distance 

 from our home waters. Its headquarters were in 

 the Basque towns of France and Spain, Bayonne, 

 Biarritz, Fuenterrabia, St. Sebastian, and many 

 smaller ports. The prey were the Atlantic right 

 whales, which then frequented the Bay of Biscay. 

 First the Basques caught them by putting out in 

 boats from the shore, and later, growing bolder, 

 followed them in ships across the Atlantic to the 

 Bermudas, Newfoundland, and Iceland. 



Queen Elizabeth and all her court depended upon the 

 Basque fishermen for the most prominent characteristics of their 

 costume. The supply was, however, diminishing, when the 

 attempt to discover the north-east route to China, about the 

 close of the sixteenth century, led to the opening up of the sea 

 between Greenland and Spitzbergen and the discovery of the Arctic 

 right whale, an animal up to that time practically unknown to 

 man. This being much more valuable, both on account of the 

 larger quantity and finer quality of the whalebone it produced, 

 and also the larger amount of its oil, for many years attracted 

 the principal attention of the whaling ships of Europe. The 

 English entered into the business at a very early period, but 

 being unacquainted with the methods of catching whales, engaged 

 Basque harpooners for all their early voyages, and closely 

 followed their methods. The very word "harpoon" is said to 

 be Basque. The Dutch also took the fishing up on a very 

 extensive scale, and established a permanent settlement on the 

 northern shore of Spitzbergen, which they named "Smeerem- 

 berg," and which was the rendezvous of the whaling fleet in 

 summer, and to which the blubber was brought for boiling. In 

 its most flourishing period the Dutch whale fishing employed as 

 many as 260 ships and 14,000 men. When, however, whales 



