I have not yet finished with the specifications of these overcharges. The ship is not at home yet, and we only know what the bill aboard ship amounts to; the recipient of it, although he is astounded at its amount, adds it and the amount of his outfitter’s bill together, and consoles himself with the thought that he has forty or fifty dollars still due him; and thus persuaded, on the arrival of the ship he goes ashore, confident of being able to pay his board for a week or two, and have enough remaining to secure him a passage home, he goes up to the owners and asks for a small sum of money for present wants. They refuse him, saying that nothing is coming to him. He demands a settlement. On obtaining it, in the first place he finds that twenty-five per cent. interest has been charged on his outfitting bill, next he finds a charge varying from ten to fifteen dollars for loading and discharging the ship. In many cases, three per cent. for insurance is packed on, and with these additional items the poor fellow is brought in debt and knows not what to do. Then the agent claps him on the shoulder and tells him to cheer up, as another ship will be ready to sail in a few days, and, if he will sign his name upon her articles, money and clothing will be advanced to him. Destitute and hopeless, down goes his name, and a few weeks afterward he is at sea again, bound on another three or four years’ voyage. The average number of barrels of oil taken by sperm whalers, during a four years’ voyage, is twelve hundred; if the ship carries four boats, a green hand’s lay is the two hundredth part; this will give him six barrels of oil, worth about forty-five dollars a barrel, amounting to two hundred and seventy dollars. The ship’s and outfitter’s bills will amount to at least two hundred and twenty dollars, leaving a residue of fifty dollars or about a dollar a month over and above personal expenses. Even if the ship should get full of oil and return home in two years, which, by the way, would be a miracle now-a-days, one of her crew cannot, at the most, make more than half as much as the day-laborer ashore.