In this time of contrary wind, those of my company which were in health, recreated themselves with fishing, and beholding the hunting and hawking of the sea, and the battell betwixt the whale and his enemies, which truly are of no small pleasure. And therefore for the curious, I will spend some time in declaration of them.
Ordinarily such ships as navigate betweene the tropiques, are accompanied with three sorts of fish: the dolphin, which the Spaniards call dozado; the bonito, or Spanish makerell; and the sharke, alias tiberune.
The dolphin.
The dolphin I hold to be one of the swiftest fishes in the sea. He is like unto a breame, but that he is longer and thinner, and his scales very small. He is of the colour of the rayn-bow, and his head different to other fishes; for, from his mouth halfe a spanne, it goeth straight upright, as the head of a wherry, or the cut-water of a ship.[86] He is very good meate if he be in season, but the best part of him is his head, which is great. They are some bigger, some lesser; the greatest that I have seene, might be some foure foote long.
I hold it not without some ground, that the auncient philosophers write, that they be enamoured of a man; for in meeting with shipping, they accompany them till they approach to colde climates; this I have noted divers times. For disembarking out of the West Indies, anno 1583, within three or foure dayes after, we mett a scole[2] of them, which left us not till we came to the ilands of Azores, nere a thousand leagues. At other times I have noted the like.
But some may say, that in the sea are many scoles[87] of this kinde of fish, and how can a man know if they were the same?
Who may be thus satisfied, that every day in the morning, which is the time that they approach neerest the ship, we should see foure, five, and more, which had, as it were, our eare-marke; one hurt upon the backe, another neere the tayle, another about the fynnes; which is a sufficient proofe that they were the same; for if those which had received so bad entertainment of us would not forsake us, much less those which we had not hurt. Yet that which makes them most in love with ships and men, are the scrappes and refreshing they gather from them.
The bonito.
The bonito, or Spanish makerell, is altogether like unto a makerell, but that it is somewhat more growne; he is reasonable foode, but dryer then a makerell. Of them there are two sorts: the one is this which I have described; the other, so great as hardly one man can lift him. At such times as wee have taken of these, one sufficed for a meale for all my company. These, from the fynne of the tayle forwards, have upon the chyne seven small yellow hillocks, close one to another.
The dolphins and bonitos are taken with certaine instruments of iron which we call vysgeis,[88] in forme of an eel speare, but that the blades are round, and the poynts like unto the head of a broad arrow: these are fastened to long staves of ten or twelve foote long, with lynes tied unto them, and so shott to the fish from the beake-head, the poope, or other parts of the shippe, as occasion is ministered. They are also caught with hookes and lynes, the hooke being bayted with a redd cloth, or with a white cloth made into the forme of a fish, and sowed upon the hooke.