Chap. XI. WHALING ARGOT, OR SLANG. 319 
other respecting a purchase without initiating the 
native into their calculations. Thus pigs and pota- 
toes were respectively represented by " grunters " and 
" spuds; " guns, powder, blankets, pipes, and tobacco, by 
" shooting-sticks, dust, spreaders, steamers/' and" weed;" 
A chief was called a " nob ;" a slave, a "doctor;'' a 
woman, a " heifer ;" a girl, a *' titter;" and a child, a 
" squeaker" Then for the different native chiefs they 
had also private names, — such as " Satan," " the Old 
"Sarpent," "the Bully," "the Badger," "the Sneak," 
" the Greybeard," " the Murderer," " the Wild Fel- 
" low," and " the Long un." 
The parties enrolled in Sydney received an advance 
and spent it there ; a brig or schooner then carried the 
whole " mob," as the party was sometimes called, to 
their station in New Zealand, with new boats, tackle, 
provisions, spirits, goods with which to barter for fire- 
wood and fresh food from the natives, clothing, tobacco, 
and various other necessaries, which were placed under 
the care of the chief headsman, and charged to him at 
an immense profit by the owner of the party in Sydney, 
as an advance on the produce of the season. Arrived in 
New Zealand, the party was joined by such members as 
had considered it convenient or agreeable to spend their 
summer there, and soon stood on a complete footing. 
The boats, which are now painted and fitted 
up, deserve a particular description. The whale- 
boat is a long clinker-built boat, sharp at both 
ends, and higher out of water at the head and stern 
than amidships, about twenty to thirty feet long, and 
varying in breadth according to the make. At the 
stern, a planking even with the gunwales reaches five 
or six feet forward, and is perforated perpendicularly 
by the loggerhead, a cylindrical piece of wood about 
six inches in diameter, which is used for checking the 
