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CHAPTER IX. 
WILLIAM SCORESBY, THE YOUNGER, WHALEFISHER AND CLERGYMAN. 
1789—1857. 
The following interesting memoir has been written by Mr. J. 
Arthur Binns, of Bradford, whose name has long been known to tlie 
literary world as that of a poet of much excellence and refinement. 
We are told that the name of Scoresby has been counted 
amongst those of the dignitaries of the North of England for six 
centuries past. Those who bore it, however, may be passed over 
until we come to William Scoresby, of Cropton, near Whitby, in 
Yorkshire, who was born in 1760, and was father of Dr Scoresby, 
Whalefisher and Vicar of Bradford. This district, it will be remem- 
bered, is noted for another great name associated with navigation, 
that of Captain Cook, whose early life was spent at Staithes on the 
same coast, and who after a distinguished career of science and dis- 
covery, both in the Polar and Pacific Oceans, found his fate at the 
hands of savages in the Sandwich Islands, when our Vicar's father 
was about twenty years of age. 
After a short training in agricultural life, William Scoresby 
apprenticed himself to a shipowner, and sailed on his first voyage 
when in his twentieth year. He had troubles enough whilst gaining 
his experience at sea. He was once a prisoner of war in Andalusia, 
and the character and variety of his experiences on his homeward 
voyage after his escape appear to have made him somewhat tired of 
his life afloat. For three or four years he settled down in his native 
village. Then he married. After a short time his adventurous spirit 
reasserted itself, and after some hesitation he chose for his vocation 
the whale fishery, which was then an exceedingly prosperous branch 
of trade for people of sea-going pursuits. At this time Whitby ships 
