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obtain the help of the Basque sailors to do for them the | 
most perilous and difficult part of the work, namely, the 
harpooning and killing of the whales. 
I gather from Eschricht and Reinhardt’s memoir, that 
this Biscayan whale was known to the French Basques 
as the Sarde, and was the same as the Nordkaper of 
the Dutch and North Germans, and the S/e¢bag of Ice- 
land, a whalebone whale. but smaller and more active 
than the great Greenland whale. The Kovge-spei/ (an 
ancient Norwegian record) has a passage to the effect 
that “those who travel on the sea fear it much, for its 
nature is to play much with vessels.’? Belonging to the 
temperate North Atlantic, it is described as much more 
active than the Greenland whale, much quicker and more 
violent in its movements, more difficult and dangerous to 
catch. It is smaller and has less blubber than the 
Mysticetus, the head shorter, and the whalebone much 
thicker, but scarcely more than half as long. 
For centuries the Basques had attacked and captured 
this formidable Cetacean ; and they, in fact, monopolised 
all the experience and skill which then existed in con- 
nection with the craft and mystery of whale-fishing. 
the sailors of all other nations it was an unknown business, 
appearing all the more perilous from their absence of 
knowledge. So it was natural that the hardy and intrepid 
fishermen from the Cantabrian coast should be in requisi- 
tion as harpooneers, as soon as the English and Dutch 
entered upon the Arctic whale-fishery, early in the seven- 
teenth century. With their services, we also borrowed 
their words. Harpoon is derived from the Basque word 
Arfoi, the root being av, “ to take quickly.” The Basque 
Harpoinari is a “ harpooneer.” 
There is a letter still extant at Alcala de Henares, from 
James |. of England to the king of Spain, dated 1612, in 
which permission is asked to engage the services, on board 
English vessels engaged in the Arctic whaling-trade, of 
Basque sailors skilled in the use of the harpoon. The 
fact that Basque boats’ crews were frequently shipped 
seems to show that this request was granted. In the 
whaling fleet fitted out for Spitzbergen in 1613, under the 
command of Benjamin Joseph, with Baffin on board the 
general's ship as pilot, twenty-four Basques were shipped. 
Orders were given that ‘‘they were to be used very kindly 
and friendly, being strangers and leaving their own country 
to do us service.” The English seem to have adopted the 
fishing rules of the Basques, as well as to have benefited 
by their skill and prowess. Thus we read of an order 
being given because ‘‘the order of the Biscaines is that 
whoso doth strike the first harping-iron into him, it is his 
whale, if his iron hold.’’ The Basques went out to attack 
the whales in the offing, while the English got ready for 
boiling-down. We read :—“ News was brought to us this 
morning that the Basks had killed a whale; therefore we 
hasted to set up our furnaces and coppers, and presently 
began work; which we continued, without any want of 
whales, till our voyage was made ”—thanks to the Basques. 
In another place Baffin calls the Basques “our whale 
strikers.” Of course the English, in due time, learnt to 
strike the whales themselves; but the Basques were their 
instructors ; and it is therefore to this noble race that we 
owe the foundation of our whaling trade. 
In travelling along the coast, I found a universal tra- 
dition of the whale-fishery ; and often the families of 
fishermen had the harpoons hanging in their houses, 
which had been there for generations. They still have 
occasion to use them when porpoises come within range ; 
and on board one of the Gijon steamers there was a man 
with unerring aim. But many harpoons hang on the 
walls as relics of the old whaling days. At Laredo the 
fishermen brought me a harpoon of peculiar construction. 
The point was narrow and very slightly barbed, but there 
was a hinge half-way up the point, which was kept in line 
with the shaft by a ring. When the harpoon entered a 
whale, the ring slipped, the hinge turned, and the point 
To | 
came at right angles to the shaft, making it impossible 
for the harpoon to come out again. Baron Nordenskidld 
informs me that this kind of harpoon is used by the 
Norwegians to kill the white whales. 
At Llanes, in Asturias, I found a large palatial house 
| which was formerly the ‘‘ Casa de Ballenas,” or house 
where business connected with the whale fishery was 
transacted. At Gijon there is also a “ Casa de Ballenas,” 
and also a street called Whale-lane. These names, with 
the coats of arms and traditions, are all relics of the old 
whaling days. At San Sebastian, too, there are enormous 
tinajas, or earthenware jars, in which the oil was stored. 
It was at one time supposed that the Balena biscayensis 
had become quite extinct; but this is certainly not the 
case. Whales are seen on the Cantabrian coast at inter- 
vals of about ten years. In 1844 a whale was seen off 
Zarauz. Boats went out and it was hit, but it broke the 
lines, and got away with two harpoons and three lances 
in its body, after having towed the boats for six hours. 
On the 25th of July, 1850, early in the morning, a whale 
appeared off Guetaria. Boats quickly pursued it, but the 
harpooneer missed his aim, and the whale went off, 
heading N.W. In January 1854 a whale and her two 
young entered the bay of San Sebastian. One of the 
young whales was singled out for attack, but the mother 
made desperate efforts to defend it, and once broke the 
line. Eventually the mother and one calf escaped, while 
the other was secured. Of course, with proper boats and 
apparatus, and if the fishermen had had a little of their 
ancestors’ experience, all three would have been caught. 
It is the skeleton of this young whale that Professor 
Eschricht purchased at Pampluna. It is now at 
Copenhagen. 
While I was at Gijon, in the Asturias, I was told by an 
old fisherman that a whale’ had been caught, about 
twenty years ago, by the villagers near the lighthouse 
on Punta de Penas. The story was not believed by 
merchants and others of whom I made inquiries, so I 
thought it best to investigate the matter myself. I, 
therefore, went westward to the little fishing-village of 
Luanco, and next day proceeded on foot across a wild 
mountainous country to the lighthouse of Punta de 
Penas; a distance of sixteen miles there and back. 
There, in the court-yard of the lighthouse, was a whale’s 
jaw-bone, and the man in charge corroborated the story. 
But he added the curious statement that the whale was 
dead and half flensed, drifting in under the land, when 
the villagers first saw it, and went out in their boats to 
tow it on shore. I also found parts of the rib-bones in 
the granary of a farm-house at Viodo, a hamlet near the 
lighthouse. 
The last whale of which I obtained intelligence was 
sighted between Guetaria and Zarauz on the 11th of 
February, 1878. Many boats went out from these two 
places, and one boat from Orio. The first harpoon that 
kept fast was thrown by a smart young sailor of Guetaria, 
the countryman of Sebastian del Cano, the first circum- 
navigator of the globe. He is now in the Spanish navy. 
Eventually the whale was killed and towed on shore. 
No one derived any benefit, because there was a law-suit 
tried at Azpeitia. It appears that the harpoon was of 
Guetaria, but that the line belonged to Zarauz. Mean- 
while the whale became unpleasant and had to be blown 
up. The authorities of San Sebastian, huwever, through 
the intervention of Don Nicolas Soraluce, secured the 
bones, and the skeleton is now carefully set up in the 
small museum in that city. It is 48 feet long, and part 
of the whale-bone remains in the jaw. There are also 
bones of a whale found in the sands at Deva in the same 
museum. I was given part of a whale’s rib dug up on 
the Lequeitio beach, and a jaw-bone which was long in 
the court-yard of the palace of the Count of Revillagigedo 
at Gijon, is now preserved in the Jovellanos Institute, in 
the same town. Of course there must be any number of 
