THE AMERICAN WHALE-FISHERY. 201 



ships are burnt at Spitzbergen ; and this was the occasion of the burning of two 

 ships in my time. They try out their train -oj'l at Spitzbergen, that they may 

 load the more fat in their ships ; and they believe it to be very profitable, for 

 they go their voyage upon part, that is to say, they receive more or less, according 

 to what they catch : but I do not account it -wisdom to fill up the room of the 

 ship with wood, where they might stow vessels. But our countrjmen, as I told 

 you before, put the fat into the vessels, wherein it doth ferment just like beer ; 

 and I know no instance that ever any vessel did fly in pieces, although they are 

 stopt up very close, and so it becometh for the greatest part train -oyl in them. 

 Of the fresh fat of whales, when it is burnt out you lose twenty in the hundred, 

 more or less, according as it is in goodness. At the place where they try up the 

 fat into train- oyl, near Hamburg, they try up the fat out of the vessels into a 

 great wooden trough or tub, and out of this two men empty it into a great kettle 

 that stands near it, that doth hold two cardels of fat, that makes one hundred and 

 twenty, one hundred and thirty, and sometimes one hundred and forty gallons. 

 Underneath this copper that is made up with bricks they put the fire, and so they 

 boil it, and try it up into train -oyl, as you try up other fat. This copper is very 

 well secured, as the dyers' coppers use to be ; it is very broad and flat, just like 

 a frying-pan made of copper. When the ftit is well tryed or fryed out, they take 

 it out of the pan with small kettles, into a great sieve, that the liquid only may 

 run through ; the rest is thrown away. This sieve stands over a great tub, which 

 is above half filled with cold water, that the hot train -oyl may be cooled, and 

 that what is unclean and dirty of the blood and other soil may fall to the bottom, 

 and only the clear train -oyl swim at the top of the water, like other oyl. In this 

 great tub or trough is a small spout or tap, which doth run out over another as 

 big as a tub, out of which the train -oyl runs into another tub, when it is almost 

 ready to run over, which is also filled with cold water to the middle, wherein it is 

 more cooled, and becomes clearer, and more refined than it was before. In this 

 trough is another spout, through which the train -oyl runs into the warehouse into 

 a vatt, whereout they fill it into cardels or vessels. Some have but two tubs. 

 A cardel or hogshead holds sixty -four gallons. A true train -oyl barrel doth hold 

 thirty -two gallons. The greaves they try up the second time, and make brown 

 train -oyl out of it; others that think it not worth their while, fling them away." 

 Having submitted a brief sketch of primitive European whaling commerce, de- 

 duced from the most reliable papers and publications accessible to us, we will now 

 enter upon an account of the American whale-fishery. 



Marine Mammals. — 26. 



