200 A HISTORY OF THE WHALE FISHERIES 



part in the Greenland fishery on any account, and 

 his book is certainly the most unsophisticated, and 

 in many respects the most intimate account of a 

 whaling voyage. In a company of eighteen ships 

 he sailed on the three-master Greenland from 

 Altona on the i6th March, 1801. From the 

 outset Kohler makes no attempt to conceal his 

 apprehensions; in many features he resembles 

 Tartarin de Tarascon, that inimitable character of 

 Daudet. 



Of the crew of forty-two, only five were Germans, 

 so it is evident that the German whaling trade at 

 this time was carried on mainly by " Dutch, Danes, 

 and Jutlanders." Kohler's opinion of sea life is 

 worth recording, " es ist ein Gott recht wohlge- 

 falliges Leben, so lange dass Schiff ruhig auf dem 

 Meere schwimmt." 



The ship's crew was divided into three watches, 

 each having four hours on duty and eight hours off. 

 Like Martens on an earlier occasion he describes 

 the method of announcing the results of their 

 fishing to passing whalers. " On these occasions I 

 have often remarked the pride of the English. 

 Every English ship waits until the other ship has 

 first given its account of the fishing, so that they 

 (the English) always give a pair of fish in excess. 

 On one occasion, as I stood on the poop to give the 

 signal our captain said, ' Give the number ten and 

 you will see that the English ship will announce 

 eleven or twelve/ And so it happened." But he 

 pays the English a compliment. " As seamen they 



