CHAPTER VI
JAPANESE SHORE STATIONS
In the summer of 1909, after a short expedition to the St. Lawrence River to hunt white porpoises, I joined the U. S. S. Albatross in the Philippines as a special naturalist for a cruise among the islands of the Dutch East Indies.
It was an exceedingly interesting trip, but even though sailing over ground where thousands of sperm whales had been killed in years gone by, not a spout was seen. We raised our first whales at the southern end of Formosa late in January, while steaming northward to Japan. They were two humpbacks, lazily rolling about in a deep bay where we had anchored to escape a typhoon which was roaring along the coast outside, and showed us that we were on the edge of the Japan whaling banks, famous among all deep-water sailors.
In February the Albatross reached the beautiful harbor of Nagasaki and while wandering about the streets of the picturesque little city I saw great quantities of whale meat on sale in the markets. Peddlers were also doing an excellent business in selling meat and blubber from house to house, and altogether Japanese whaling appeared to be in a flourishing condition.
Since absolutely nothing was known, scientifically or otherwise, about the large whales of this coast, I determined to leave the Albatross and investigate the fishery as well as to secure specimens for the Museum, if possible.
“In some instances the whales are drawn out upon the slip in the Norwegian way.”
In Shimonoseki, where one of the offices of the whaling company is located, I found the president of the Toyo Hogei Kabushiki Kaisha (Oriental Whaling Company, Ltd.) most cordial in his attitude toward my proposed work. He offered to assist me in every possible way, and a few days later I boarded a little Japanese freight steamer which all day and night plowed her way through the beautiful islet-dotted waters of the Inland Sea to Oshima, famous in Japanese history.
At Oshima I made my home with Mr. Ikeda, the manager, and his wife, in a delightful little house built into the side of a hill which overlooked the beautiful bay with the village of Kishimoto on the opposite shore. I have lived with many people in many lands while wandering about the world, but never have I had a host or hostess who did more to further my work and personal comfort than these two delightful Japanese.
The whales are handled in such an unusual way in Japan that there was much to learn about the industry itself. The stations are usually situated not far from the feeding grounds of the animals, in or near one of the little fishing villages which dot the coast in every bay or harbor. Eight or ten large wooden buildings compose the factory, and there is always a long wharf projecting into deep water, at the end of which stand upright a pair of long heavy poles inclined forward and joined at their extremities by a massive crosspiece; from this are suspended the blocks through which run wire cables from the steam winch.
In some instances the whales are drawn out upon the slip in the Norwegian way, but the more usual Japanese method is a modification of that used by the deep-sea whalers; the animals are cut in while lying in the water, the poles at the end of the wharf being substituted for the masts of a ship.
“She was listing far to starboard and we could see the huge flukes of a blue whale ... waving at her bow.”
Late in the morning on the day after I arrived at Oshima the long-drawn wail of a siren whistle sounded far down the bay, and in a few moments a little whaling vessel swept proudly around a picturesque rocky headland and steamed swiftly toward the station. She was listing far to starboard and we could see the huge flukes of a blue whale, the shiro-nagasu kujira of the Japanese, waving at her bow, the carcass stretching alongside almost to the stern.
She slipped quietly up to the end of the wharf and two cutters sculled a sampan out to meet her. There were a few hoarse shouts, a sharp command, the rattle of a heavy chain, and a great splash as the whale was dropped into the water.
“A steel wire cable was looped about the tail just in front of the flukes, and the huge carcass drawn slowly upward over the end of the wharf.”
On shore the station bell was clanging and men were assembling on the wharf; strong well-built fellows they were, many of them half naked and busy sharpening the blades of murderous-looking knives. With them mingled dozens of women and girls clad in tight blue trousers and kimonas, each one armed with a stout iron hook or with carrying racks slung over their shoulders.
In a few moments the rattling steam winch had brought the whale close in shore, a steel wire cable was looped about the tail just in front of the flukes, and the huge carcass drawn slowly upward over the end of the wharf.
As it rose the eager cutters attacked it savagely with their long-bladed knives, slicing off enormous blocks of flesh and blubber which were seized by “hook men” almost before they fell, passed to the women, and drawn to the back of the platform.
Meanwhile two other cutters in a sampan were at work dividing the carcass just in front of the dorsal fin. The entire posterior part of the whale was then drawn upward and lowered on the wharf to be stripped of blubber and flesh. Transverse incisions were made in the portion of the body remaining in the water, a hook was fastened to a “blanket piece,” and as the blubber was torn off by the winch the carcass rolled over and over. The head, disjointed at the neck, was hoisted bodily upon the pier. Section by section the carcass was cut apart and drawn upward to fall into the hands of the men on the wharf and be sliced into great blocks two or three feet square.
The scene was one of “orderly confusion”—men, women and girls, laughing and chattering, running here and there, sometimes stopping for a few words of banter but each with his or her own work to do. Above the babel of sounds, the strange, half wild, meaningless chant, “Ya-ra-cu-ra-sa,” rose and died away, swelling again in a fierce chorus as the sweating, half-naked men pulled and strained at a great jawbone or swung the hundred-pound chunks of flesh into the waiting hand cars which carried them to the washing vats. Sometimes a kimona-clad, bare-footed girl slipped on the oily boards or treacherous, sliding, blubber cakes and sprawled into a great pool of blood, rising amid roars of laughter to shake herself, wipe the red blotches from her little snub nose and go on as merrily as before.
“Section by section the carcass was cut apart and drawn upward to fall into the hands of the men on the wharf and be sliced into great blocks two or three feet square.”
It was essentially a good-natured crowd, working hard and ceaselessly but apparently deriving as much fun from their labor as though it were a holiday. The spirit of the place was infectious, and as I splashed about in the blood and grease, I talked and joked with the cutters in bad Japanese, causing screams of laughter when I seriously informed them that “the sun was very hot water” by the quite natural mistake of substituting the word atsui-yu for atsui (hot).
Almost every night we would be awakened by the siren whistle bringing the news of more whales. If I did not at once stir, the little amah (maid), always devoted to my interests, would quietly slide back the paper screen to the sleeping room and say, “Andrews-san, go Hogei wa kujira ga torn mashita” (Hogei No. 5 has caught whales). When I had rolled out of the comfortable futons and begun to dress, I would hear little Scio-san pattering about in the other room, gathering my pencils, notebook, and tape measure. Looking like a beautiful night-moth in her bright-colored kimona, with the huge bow of her obi (sash) always neatly arranged, she would be there to help me into the greasy oilskins and rubber boots, and would clump along in front to the wharf, lighting the way with a chochin (paper lantern) that I might not bump my head on the eaves and rafters of the low station shed.
“Transverse incisions were made in the portion of the body remaining in the water, a hook was fastened to a ‘blanket piece’ and as the blubber was torn off by the winch the carcass rolled over and over.”
Every day Scio-san religiously went to her ugly little stone joss in the playhouse temple on the hillside and prayed that the “American-san” might catch many whales and porpoises for the hakubutsu-kwan (museum) in the wonderful fairy city across the Pacific, of which he had so often told her. And when the season was ended and she had ventured to ask the American-san himself to thank the joss, and to please her he had done so, her joy could hardly be contained and the tip of her little nose was almost red from constant rubbing on the tatami (floor matting) in her bows of thanks and farewell.
Even though it was the very middle of the night when a ship’s whistle sounded, long before the whale had been dropped at the wharf, paper lanterns, flashing like fireflies, would begin to shine and disappear among the thatched-roofed cottages and the crowd of villagers gathering at the end of the wharf. Half-naked men, child-faced geishas, and little youngsters carrying sleeping babies as large as themselves strapped to their backs, formed a curious, picturesque, ever changing group.
Fires of coal and fat in iron racks along the wharf threw a brilliant, yellow light far out over the bay filled with whale ships, heavy, square-sterned fishing-boats and sampans, and gave weird fantastic shapes to the cutters as it glistened on their dripping knife blades and danced over the pools of blood. But the work always went on as quickly as in the daytime, no matter what the hour or weather, for the meat and blubber must be hurried on board fast transports and sent to the nearest city to be sold in the markets and peddled from house to house.
The inner side of a strip of blubber as it is being torn from a whale.
Few people realize the great part which whale meat plays in the life of the ordinary Japanese. Too poor to buy beef, their diet would include little but rice, fish, and vegetables, were it not for the great supply of flesh and blubber furnished by the huge water mammals. In winter, if there is little fish to be had, the meat of the humpback whale, which is most highly esteemed, sometimes brings as much as thirty sen (fifteen cents) per pound; but this is very unusual and ordinarily it can be bought for fifteen sen or less. But the edible portions are not only the flesh and blubber. The heart, liver, tongue, intestines, and other parts of the viscera are prepared for human consumption, and what little remains is first tried out to extract the oil, then chipped by means of hand knives, and dried in the sun for fertilizer.
“What ... remains is first tried out to extract the oil, then chipped by means of hand knives, and dried in the sun for fertilizer.”
Whale meat is coarse grained and tastes something like venison but has a flavor peculiarly its own. I have eaten it for many days in succession and found it not only palatable but healthful. In fact a chemical analysis shows it to contain about 98 per cent. of digestible material, whereas ordinary beef has seldom more than 93 per cent. The Japanese prepare it in a variety of ways but perhaps it is most frequently chopped finely, mixed with vegetables, and eaten raw, dressed with a brown sauce called shoyu.
In the summer when it is impossible to ship the meat long distances because of the heat, much of it is canned. The flesh is cooked in great kettles and the cans made, packed, and labeled at the stations; the meat is then shipped to all parts of the Empire.
Whale meat on the washing platforms ready to be sent to market.
It is most unfortunate that prejudice prevents whale meat from being eaten in Europe and America. It could not, of course, be sent fresh to the large cities, but canned in the Japanese fashion it is vastly superior to much of the beef and other tinned foods now on sale in our markets. In New Zealand, the Messrs. Cook Brothers, who have developed the method of capturing humpback whales in wire nets (described in the Introduction), can a great deal of meat and ship it to the South Sea Islands, where it is sold to the natives.
The baleen of the fin whales, which is of little value in Europe and America, has been put to many uses by the Japanese. When I visited the exhibition rooms of the Toyo Hogei Kabushiki Kaisha in Tokyo, I was astonished and delighted at the cigar and cigarette cases, charcoal baskets, sandals, and other beautiful things created by their clever brains and skillful fingers from the material which in the hands of Western nations seems to be almost useless.