Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 17.djvu/396



388 LETTERS OF ELIHU WRIGHT

IV. North Pacific Ocean, Ship Enterprise,

May, 1823. Dear Brother :

With a kind of indifference I take pen and ink to write a line which will serve rather as history than a letter as the passage at best will be long as the ship is not full by which I send but may inform you when it comes to hand that I am well. As for success in our line of business we rank among the middling. We were nine months out with but about 30 bbls. of oil. On leaving the Sandwich Islands we were mated with the ship Phoenix of Nantucket and we have taken 31 sperm whale and 17 of them to our ship and ten of them to the boat that I and Jno. belonged to, though the largest of the ten made 250 bbls. the whole amount to both ships is 1700 bbls. We have been as far west as the 149th degree of E. Long., found the most of our fish in 153 or 4 E. and 323 N. lat. The 11 of June we discovered a reef of rocks which have not been heard of before, not being laid down in any map or chart. They were discovered just at night. It was perfectly calm and we had whale on board so that we did not go to them that night and before morning we drifted out of sight of them. We heard by the Lydia that the ship Ganges of New York saw the same one. This coast is entirely unexplored except by whale men and well it may be as it is the most out of the way place there is in God's creation.

Now we are returning to the Sandwich Isl. to recruit, being in latitude 33 N. Long. 160 West. We are calculating to part from the Phoenix in a few days, as she is bound into the Spanish coast for provisions,

I have received no particular news from you since I left Scrap Island more than 12 months since. We spoke the ship Globe the 31st of Aug. all well 450 bbl. Jno. received a letter by Wm. Lay who I was much disappointed to see. He