THE AMERICAN WHALE FISHERIES 251 



mendations, taken. Such will have superior chances 

 for advancement. Outfits, to the amount of seventy- 

 five dollars, furnished to each individual before 

 proceeding to sea. 



Persons desirous to avail themselves of the present 

 splendid opportunity of seeing the world, and at the 

 same time acquiring" a profitable business, will do 

 well to make early application to the undersigned." 



It is to be feared that the treatment of these green- 

 horns was in general of a very brutal nature. Their 

 earnings, too, were contemptible. The system of 

 payment was by " lays." Average lays varied from 

 about a twelfth for the captain to a hundred and 

 seventy-five for a greenhand. It was by no means 

 uncommon for an ordinary seamen to receive two 

 or three dollars, or even nothing at all, as his 

 share after a long and hazardous voyage. He had, 

 of course, been kept, and received advances 

 during the voyage ; what the food and conditions 

 were like can be estimated by reading the works 

 above named. 



Olmstead's book was published at New York in 

 1841, and describes a voyage made in the barque 

 North America of New London. 



J. Ross Browne's book, which, in many respects, 

 is the best personal description of a voyage in an 

 American whaler, was published at New York in 

 1850; Browne joined a New Bedford whaler as a 

 landsman or greenhand (in 1842). The brutalities 

 to which the greenhands were subjected is relieved 

 by the humour of some of the scenes on board, one 

 of the seamen, Bill Man by name, who had 

 previously been a scene shifter in a Bowery theatre 



