202 A HISTORY OF THE WHALE FISHERIES 



be full of worms. It looked exactly like peat, and 

 had to be washed before it could be eaten. The 

 water was as bad as the bread, since the empty 

 water casks were filled with whale oil, and after a 

 perfunctory cleaning used for water again in the 

 following year. " Manches Pass stinkt wie eine 

 Kloake und dennoch darf kein Tropfen davon 

 vergossen werden." 



The feeding conditions on merchant vessels 

 generally were at this period extremely bad, and it 

 does not appear that whalers were much worse off 

 than other sailors. The whalers were overcrowded, 

 poorly ventilated, and very wet when there was any 

 sea on. The sleeping quarters were dark, and 

 provisions as a rule of inferior quality. The men 

 were often without a change of clothing and 

 suffered much from scurvy and skin diseases. 

 Probably the whalers were, if anything, rather better 

 off than the average merchant seaman. 



There were, at any rate, possibilities of varying 

 their food. Occasionally whale flesh was tried; 

 Martens tried it, but preferred beef. J. J. Janssen, 

 whose crew were compelled to eat whale flesh, took 

 to it well. Sometimes seagulls were eaten; bear's 

 flesh was also eaten. Christian Bullen, who wrote 

 the first account of a German whaler's voyage to 

 Greenland, complained that it tasted to him 

 " grimmiglick wie ein Bar. 1 ' Bullen was, however, a 

 consistent grumbler, the only dish that pleased him 

 being " seal's heart with liver and lights." 



In the bays of Spitsbergen the whalers obtained 



