ACROSS THE CAPE. 
131 
in July, 1855. A carpenter who was working at the 
light-house arriving early in the morning remarked that 
he did not know but he had lost fifty dollars by coming 
to his work ; for as he came along the Bay side he heard 
them driving a school of blackfish ashore, and he had 
debated with himself whether he should not go and join 
them and take his share, but had concluded to come to 
his work. After breakfast I came over to this place, 
about two miles distant, and near the beach met some of 
the fishermen returning from their chase. Looking up 
and down the shore, I could see about a mile south some 
large black masses on the sand, which I knew must be 
blackfish, and a man or two about them. As I walked 
along towards them I soon came to a huge carcass whose 
head was gone and whose blubber had be^n stripped off 
some weeks before; the tide was just beginning to move 
it, and the stench compelled me to go a long way 
round. When I came to Great Hollow I found a fish¬ 
erman and some boys on the watch, and counted about 
thirty blackfish, just killed, with many lance wounds, and 
the water was more or less bloody around. They were 
partly on shore and partly in the water, held by a rope 
round their tails till the tide should leave them. A boat 
had been somewhat stove by the tail of one. They were 
a smooth shining black, like India-rubber, and had 
remarkably simple and lumpish forms for animated 
creatures, with a blunt round snout or head, whale-like, 
and simple stiff-looking flippers. The largest were about 
fifteen feet long, but one or two were only five feet 
long, and still without teeth. The fisherman- slashed 
one with his jackknife, to show me how thick the blubber 
was, — about three inches; and as I passed my finger 
through the cut it was covered thick with oil. The 
