Waymouth’s Journal of his voyage to America in 1605 gives the first description of the Indian method of whaling in canoes on the New England coast from November to April, when spouters generally abounded there. “One especial thing is their manner of killing the whale” runs the quaint description “which they call a powdawe; and will describe his form; how he bloweth up the water; and that he is twelve fathoms long: that they go in company of their king with a multitude of their boats; and strike him with a bone made in fashion of a harping iron fastened to a rope, which they make great and strong of the bark of trees, which they veer out after him; then all their boats come about him as he riseth above water, with their arrows they shoot him to death; when they have killed him and dragged him to shore, they call all their chief lords together, and sing a song of joy; and those chief lords, whom they call sagamores, divide the spoil and give to every man a share, which pieces so distributed, they hang up about their houses for provisions; and when they boil them they blow off the fat and put to their pease, maize and other pulse which they eat.” [Illustration: Early method of bringing whales on shore by means of a windlass.] The Esquimaux at this time were very much more advanced than the Indians, and showed their ingenuity by inventing the “toggle” harpoon, which is in use to this day, and which was improved upon in 1848 by a Negro in New Bedford called Lewis Temple, who made his fortune turning out irons. This harpoon was arranged to sink very easily into the blubber, but when pulled out the end turned at right angles to the shank, thus preventing the harpoon from withdrawing. Boston is mentioned only occasionally in connection with the Whale Fishery. During 1707 the Boston papers state that a whale forty feet long entered the harbour and was killed near Noddle’s Island, and another interesting record is in a letter written in 1724 by the Hon. Paul Dudley, who mentions that he has just received a note from a Mr. Atkins of Boston, who was one of the first to go fishing for sperm whales. There were many whaleships recorded in the Boston records, although fitting out and sailing from other neighboring ports. NANTUCKET A large part of the romance of whaling centres around the island of Nantucket and its hardy seamen. It was from here that the Red Men first sallied out in canoes to chase the whale; from here the small sloops first set out laden with cobblestones, as the story goes, to throw at the whales to see if they were near enough to risk a harpoon. These daring Nantucketers were, in 1791, the first to sail to the Pacific, and later on in 1820 to the coast of Japan, and finally they made their ships known in every harbour of the world. Thirty islands and reefs in the Pacific are named after Nantucket captains and merchants.