112 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



mous as to call forth loud and frequent complaints;* and in later years 

 the only available western fishery was in the North Pacific and Arctic 

 Oceans, where disasters were the rule and immunity from them the ex- 

 ception, thereby incurring, when the vessels were not lost, heavy bills 

 for repairs, besides the ordinary ones of refitting. 



Again, during the later days of whaling, more particularly imme- 

 diately after the discovery of the gold mines in California, desertions 

 from the ships were numerous and often causeless, generally in such 

 numbers as to seriously cripple the efficiency of the ship. In this way 

 large numbers of voyages were broken up and hundreds of thousands 

 of dollars were sunk by the owners. During a portion of the time many 

 ships were fired by their refractory and mutinous crews, some of them 

 completely destroyed, others damaged in amounts varying from a few 

 hundred to several thousand dollars. Crews would apparently ship 

 simply as a cheap manner of reaching the gold mines, and a ship's com- 

 pany often embraced among its number desperadoes from various na- 

 tions, fit for any rascality which might best serve them to attain their 

 end. They took no interest in the voyage, nor cared aught for the profit 

 or loss that might accrue to the owners. In order to recruit, it became 

 necessary, particularly during the ten years next succeeding the open- 

 ing of the gold mines, to offer heavy advance- wages, and too often these 

 were paid to a set of bounty -jumpers, as such men were termed in the 

 Army during the late war, who only waited the time when the ship 

 made another port to clandestinely dissolve connection with her and 

 hold themselves in readiness for the next ship. Unquestionably there 

 were times when men were forced to desert to save their lives from 

 the impositions and severity of brutal captains, but such cases were un- 

 doubtedly very rare. Formerly the crews were composed almost wholly 

 of Americans, but latterly they were largely made up of Portuguese 

 shipped at the Azores, a mongrel set shipped anywhere along the west- 

 ern coast of South America, and Kanakas shipped at the Pacific islands. 

 There were times, when the California fever was at its highest, that the 

 desertions did not stop with the men, but officers and even captains 

 seem to vie with the crew in defrauding the men from whose hands they 

 had received the property to hold in charge and increase in value. 

 Another source of loss was, strangely enough, to be found in the 



* The increased cost of refitting has for years been a .source of serious concern to 

 ship-owners. A meeting of agents was held in New Bedford, in February, 1860, to 

 take some action in regard to this evil. Among the things complained of, besides the 

 enormous charges, were the extortions of consuls, the decisions of the courts of admi- 

 ralty, the inducements offered to sailors to desert, &c. The New London Star, in 1859, 

 said that in order to make whaling profitable business must be done where the vessel 

 is owned, not one-fourth in New Loudon and three-fourths in Honolulu ; however 

 poorly a ship did in the aggregate, Honolulu fared just as well. "All the business 

 must be done in the home port to make it profitable, and the sooner whaling-merchants 

 withdraw their ships from the Sandwich Islands the better it will be for all concerned. 

 The deluge of oil that is thrown into the eastern market by holding it at the islands 

 until some freighter wants a cargo, and then sending it home, operates with great 

 detriment to the holders of oil at the home ports." 



