Captains would sometimes ship some of their oil and baleen back to the United States early, onboard other whalers or steamers heading back. This is a written receipt declaring that 24 packages of oil (approximately 184 barrels), from the ship Henry Tabor, had been taken in Barbados for delivery to New York or Boston. The charge for transport was $1.20 in gold per barrel of oil, each barrel holding approximately 31.5 gallons.