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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Fighting the Whales, by R.M. Ballantyne
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Fighting the Whales
+
+Author: R.M. Ballantyne
+
+Release Date: June 7, 2007 [EBook #21731]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIGHTING THE WHALES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
+
+
+
+
+FIGHTING THE WHALES, BY R.M. BALLANTYNE.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ONE.
+
+IN TROUBLE, TO BEGIN WITH.
+
+There are few things in this world that have filled me with so much
+astonishment as the fact that man can kill a whale!  That a fish, more
+than sixty feet long, and thirty feet round the body; with the bulk of
+three hundred fat oxen rolled into one; with the strength of many
+hundreds of horses; able to swim at a rate that would carry it right
+round the world in twenty-three days; that can smash a boat to atoms
+with one slap of its tail, and stave in the planks of a ship with one
+blow of its thick skull;--that such a monster can be caught and killed
+by man, is most wonderful to hear of, but I can tell from experience
+that it is much more wonderful to see.
+
+There is a wise saying which I have often thought much upon.  It is
+this: "Knowledge is power."  Man is but a feeble creature, and if he had
+to depend on his own bodily strength alone, he could make no head
+against even the ordinary brutes in this world.  But the knowledge which
+has been given to him by his Maker has clothed man with great power, so
+that he is more than a match for the fiercest beast in the forest, or
+the largest fish in the sea.  Yet, with all his knowledge, with all his
+experience, and all his power, the killing of a great old sperm whale
+costs man a long, tough battle, sometimes it even costs him his life.
+
+It is a long time now since I took to fighting the whales.  I have been
+at it, man and boy, for nigh forty years, and many a wonderful sight
+have I seen; many a desperate battle have I fought in the fisheries of
+the North and South Seas.
+
+Sometimes, when I sit in the chimney-corner of a winter evening, smoking
+my pipe with my old messmate Tom Lokins, I stare into the fire, and
+think of the days gone by, till I forget where I am, and go on thinking
+so hard that the flames seem to turn into melting fires, and the bars of
+the grate into dead fish, and the smoke into sails and rigging, and I go
+to work cutting up the blubber and stirring the oil-pots, or pulling the
+bow-oar and driving the harpoon at such a rate that I can't help giving
+a shout, which causes Tom to start and cry:--
+
+"Hallo!  Bob," (my name is Bob Ledbury, you see).  "Hallo!  Bob, wot's
+the matter?"
+
+To which I reply, "Tom, can it all be true?"
+
+"Can _wot_ be true?" says he, with a stare of surprise--for Tom is
+getting into his dotage now.
+
+And then I chuckle and tell him I was only thinking of old times, and so
+he falls to smoking again, and I to staring at the fire, and thinking as
+hard as ever.
+
+The way in which I was first led to go after the whales was curious.
+This is how it happened.
+
+About forty years ago, when I was a boy of nearly fifteen years of age,
+I lived with my mother in one of the seaport towns of England.  There
+was great distress in the town at that time, and many of the hands were
+out of work.  My employer, a blacksmith, had just died, and for more
+than six weeks I had not been able to get employment or to earn a
+farthing.  This caused me great distress, for my father had died without
+leaving a penny in the world, and my mother depended on me entirely.
+The money I had saved out of my wages was soon spent, and one morning
+when I sat down to breakfast, my mother looked across the table and
+said, in a thoughtful voice--
+
+"Robert, dear, this meal has cost us our last halfpenny."
+
+My mother was old and frail, and her voice very gentle; she was the most
+trustful, uncomplaining woman I ever knew.
+
+I looked up quickly into her face as she spoke.  "All the money gone,
+mother?"
+
+"Ay, all.  It will be hard for you to go without your dinner, Robert,
+dear."
+
+"It will be harder for you, mother," I cried, striking the table with my
+fist; then a lump rose in my throat and almost choked me.  I could not
+utter another word.
+
+It was with difficulty I managed to eat the little food that was before
+me.  After breakfast I rose hastily and rushed out of the house,
+determined that I would get my mother her dinner, even if I should have
+to beg for it.  But I must confess that a sick feeling came over me when
+I thought of begging.
+
+Hurrying along the crowded streets without knowing very well what I
+meant to do, I at last came to an abrupt halt at the end of the pier.
+Here I went up to several people and offered my services in a wild sort
+of way.  They must have thought that I was drunk, for nearly all of them
+said gruffly that they did not want me.
+
+Dinner time drew near, but no one had given me a job, and no wonder, for
+the way in which I tried to get one was not likely to be successful.  At
+last I resolved to beg.  Observing a fat, red-faced old gentleman coming
+along the pier, I made up to him boldly.  He carried a cane with a large
+gold knob on the top of it.  That gave me hope, "for of course," thought
+I, "he must be rich."  His nose, which was exactly the colour and shape
+of the gold knob on his cane, was stuck in the centre of a round,
+good-natured countenance, the mouth of which was large and firm; the
+eyes bright and blue.  He frowned as I went forward hat in hand; but I
+was not to be driven back; the thought of my starving mother gave me
+power to crush down my rising shame.  Yet I had no reason to be ashamed.
+I was willing to work, if only I could have got employment.
+
+Stopping in front of the old gentleman, I was about to speak when I
+observed him quietly button up his breeches pocket.  The blood rushed to
+my face, and, turning quickly on my heel, I walked away without uttering
+a word.
+
+"Hallo!" shouted a gruff voice just as I was moving away.
+
+I turned and observed that the shout was uttered by a broad
+rough-looking jack-tar, a man of about two or three and thirty, who had
+been sitting all the forenoon on an old cask smoking his pipe and
+basking in the sun.
+
+"Hallo!" said he again.
+
+"Well," said I.
+
+"Wot d'ye mean, youngster, by goin' on in that there fashion all the
+mornin', a-botherin' everybody, and makin' a fool o' yourself like that?
+eh!"
+
+"What's that to you?" said I savagely, for my heart was sore and heavy,
+and I could not stand the interference of a stranger.
+
+"Oh! it's nothin' to me of course," said the sailor, picking his pipe
+quietly with his clasp-knife; "but come here, boy, I've somethin' to say
+to ye."
+
+"Well, what is it?" said I, going up to him somewhat sulkily.
+
+The man looked at me gravely through the smoke of his pipe, and said,
+"You're in a passion, my young buck, that's all; and, in case you didn't
+know it, I thought I'd tell ye."
+
+I burst into a fit of laughter.  "Well, I believe you're not far wrong,
+but I'm better now."
+
+"Ah, that's right," said the sailor, with an approving nod of his head,
+"always confess when you're in the wrong.  Now, younker, let me give you
+a bit of advice.  Never get into a passion if you can help it, and if
+you can't help it get out of it as fast as possible, and if you can't
+get out of it, just give a great roar to let off the steam and turn
+about and run.  There's nothing like that.  Passion han't got legs.  It
+can't hold on to a feller when he's runnin'.  If you keep it up till you
+a'most split your timbers, passion has no chance.  It _must_ go a-starn.
+Now, lad, I've been watchin' ye all the mornin', and I see there's a
+screw loose somewhere.  If you'll tell me wot it is, see if I don't help
+you!"
+
+The kind frank way in which this was said quite won my heart, so I sat
+down on the old cask, and told the sailor all my sorrows.
+
+"Boy," said he, when I had finished, "I'll put you in the way o' helpin'
+your mother.  I can get you a berth in my ship, if you're willin' to
+take a trip to the whale-fishery of the South Seas."
+
+"And who will look after my mother when I'm away?" said I.
+
+The sailor looked perplexed at the question.
+
+"Ah, that's a puzzler," he replied, knocking the ashes out of his pipe.
+"Will you take me to your mother's house, lad?"
+
+"Willingly," said I, and, jumping up, I led the way.  As we turned to
+go, I observed that the old gentleman with the gold-headed cane was
+leaning over the rail of the pier at a short distance from us.  A
+feeling of anger instantly rose within me, and I exclaimed, loud enough
+for him to hear--
+
+"I do believe that stingy old chap has been listening to every word
+we've been saying!"
+
+I thought I observed a frown on the sailor's brow as I said this, but he
+made no remark, and in a few minutes we were walking rapidly through the
+streets.  My companion stopped at one of those stores so common in
+seaport towns, where one can buy almost anything, from a tallow candle
+to a brass cannon.  Here he purchased a pound of tea, a pound of sugar,
+a pound of butter, and a small loaf,--all of which he thrust into the
+huge pockets of his coat.  He had evidently no idea of proportion or of
+household affairs.  It was a simple, easy way of settling the matter, to
+get a pound of everything.
+
+In a short time we reached our house, a very old one, in a poor
+neighbourhood, and entered my mother's room.  She was sitting at the
+table when we went in, with a large Bible before her, and a pair of
+horn-spectacles on her nose.  I could see that she had been out
+gathering coals and cinders during my absence, for a good fire burned in
+the grate, and the kettle was singing cheerily thereon.
+
+"I've brought a friend to see you, mother," said I.
+
+"Good-day, mistress," said the sailor bluntly, sitting down on a stool
+near the fire.  "You seem to be goin' to have your tea."
+
+"I expect to have it soon," replied my mother.
+
+"Indeed!" said I, in surprise.  "Have you anything in the kettle?"
+
+"Nothing but water, my son."
+
+"Has anybody brought you anything, then, since I went out?"
+
+"Nobody."
+
+"Why, then, mistress," broke in the seaman, "how can you expect to have
+your tea so soon?"
+
+My mother took off her spectacles, looked calmly in the man's face, laid
+her hand on the Bible, and said, "Because I have been a widow woman
+these three years, and never once in all that time have I gone a single
+day without a meal.  When the usual hour came I put on my kettle to
+boil, for this Word tells me that `the Lord will provide.'  I _expect_
+my tea to-night."
+
+The sailor's face expressed puzzled astonishment at these words, and he
+continued to regard my mother with a look of wonder as he drew forth his
+supplies of food, and laid them on the table.
+
+In a short time we were all enjoying a cup of tea, and talking about the
+whale-fishery, and the difficulty of my going away while my mother was
+dependent on me.  At last the sailor rose to leave us.  Taking a
+five-pound note from his pocket, he laid it on the table and said--
+
+"Mistress, this is all I have in the world, but I've got neither family
+nor friends, and I'm bound for the South Seas in six days; so, if you'll
+take it, you're welcome to it, and if your son Bob can manage to cast
+loose from you without leaving you to sink, I'll take him aboard the
+ship that I sail in.  He'll always find me at the Bull and Griffin, in
+the High Street, or at the end o' the pier."
+
+While the sailor was speaking, I observed a figure standing in a dark
+corner of the room near the door, and, on looking more closely, I found
+that it was the old gentleman with the nose like his cane-knob.  Seeing
+that he was observed, he came forward and said--
+
+"I trust that you will forgive my coming here without invitation; but I
+happened to overhear part of the conversation between your son and this
+seaman, and I am willing to help you over your little difficulty, if you
+will allow me."
+
+The old gentleman said this in a very quick, abrupt way, and looked as
+if he were afraid his offer might be refused.  He was much heated, with
+climbing our long stair no doubt, and as he stood in the middle of the
+room, puffing and wiping his bald head with a handkerchief, my mother
+rose hastily and offered him a chair.
+
+"You are very kind, sir," she said; "do sit down, sir.  I'm sure I don't
+know why you should take so much trouble.  But, dear me, you are very
+warm; will you take a cup of tea to cool you?"
+
+"Thank you, thank you.  With much pleasure, unless, indeed, your son
+objects to a `_stingy old chap_' sitting beside him."
+
+I blushed when he repeated my words, and attempted to make some apology;
+but the old gentleman stopped me by commencing to explain his intentions
+in short, rapid sentences.
+
+To make a long story short, he offered to look after my mother while I
+was away, and, to prove his sincerity, laid down five shillings, and
+said he would call with that sum every week as long as I was absent.  My
+mother, after some trouble, agreed to let me go, and, before that
+evening closed, everything was arranged, and the gentleman, leaving his
+address, went away.
+
+The sailor had been so much filled with surprise at the suddenness of
+all this, that he could scarcely speak.  Immediately after the departure
+of the old gentleman, he said, "Well, good-bye, mistress, good-bye,
+Bob," and throwing on his hat in a careless way, left the room.
+
+"Stop," I shouted after him, when he had got about half-way down stair.
+
+"Hallo! wot's wrong now?"
+
+"Nothing, I only forgot to ask your name."
+
+"Tom Lokins," he bellowed, in the hoarse voice of a regular boatswain,
+"w'ich wos my father's name before me."
+
+So saying, he departed, whistling "Rule Britannia" with all his might.
+
+Thus the matter was settled.  Six days afterwards, I rigged myself out
+in a blue jacket, white ducks, and a straw hat, and went to sea.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO.
+
+AT SEA.
+
+My first few days on the ocean were so miserable that I oftentimes
+repented of having left my native land.  I was, as my new friend Tom
+Lokins said, as sick as a dog.  But in course of time I grew well, and
+began to rejoice in the cool fresh breezes and the great rolling billows
+of the sea.
+
+Many and many a time I used to creep out to the end of the bowsprit,
+when the weather was calm, and sit with my legs dangling over the deep
+blue water, and my eyes fixed on the great masses of rolling clouds in
+the sky, thinking of the new course of life I had just begun.  At such
+times the thought of my mother was sure to come into my mind, and I
+thought of her parting words, "Put your trust in the Lord, Robert, and
+read His Word."  I resolved to try to obey her, but this I found was no
+easy matter, for the sailors were a rough lot of fellows, who cared
+little for the Bible.  But, I must say, they were a hearty, good-natured
+set, and much better, upon the whole, than many a ship's crew that I
+afterwards sailed with.
+
+We were fortunate in having fair winds this voyage, and soon found
+ourselves on the other side of the _line_, as we jack-tars call the
+Equator.
+
+Of course the crew did not forget the old custom of shaving all the men
+who had never crossed the line before.  Our captain was a jolly old man,
+and uncommonly fond of "sky-larking."  He gave us leave to do what we
+liked the day we crossed the line; so, as there were a number of wild
+spirits among us, we broke through all the ordinary rules, or, rather,
+we added on new rules to them.
+
+The old hands had kept the matter quiet from us greenhorns, so that,
+although we knew they were going to do some sort of mischief, we didn't
+exactly understand what it was to be.
+
+About noon of that day I was called on deck and told that old father
+Neptune was coming aboard, and we were to be ready to receive him.  A
+minute after, I saw a tremendous monster come up over the side of the
+ship and jump on the deck.  He was crowned with sea-weed, and painted in
+a wonderful fashion; his clothes were dripping wet, as if he had just
+come from the bottom of the sea.  After him came another monster with a
+petticoat made of sailcloth, and a tippet of a bit of old tarpaulin.
+This was Neptune's wife, and these two carried on the most remarkable
+antics I ever saw.  I laughed heartily, and soon discovered, from the
+tones of their voices, which of my shipmates Neptune and his wife were.
+But my mirth was quickly stopped when I was suddenly seized by several
+men, and my face was covered over with a horrible mixture of tar and
+grease!
+
+Six of us youngsters were treated in this way; then the lather was
+scraped off with a piece of old hoop-iron, and, after being thus shaved,
+buckets of cold water were thrown over us.
+
+At last, after a prosperous voyage, we arrived at our fishing-ground in
+the South Seas, and a feeling of excitement and expectation began to
+show itself among the men, insomuch that our very eyes seemed brighter
+than usual.
+
+One night those of us who had just been relieved from watch on deck,
+were sitting on the lockers down below telling ghost stories.
+
+It was a dead calm, and one of those intensely dark, hot nights, that
+cause sailors to feel uneasy, they scarce know why.  I began to feel so
+uncomfortable at last, listening to the horrible tales which Tom Lokins
+was relating to the men, that I slipt away from them with the intention
+of going on deck.  I moved so quietly that no one observed me; besides,
+every eye was fixed earnestly on Tom, whose deep low voice was the only
+sound that broke the stillness of all around.  As I was going very
+cautiously up the ladder leading to the deck, Tom had reached that part
+of his story where the ghost was just appearing in a dark churchyard,
+dressed in white, and coming slowly forward, one step at a time, towards
+the terrified man who saw it.  The men held their breath, and one or two
+of their faces turned pale as Tom went on with his description, lowering
+his voice to a hoarse whisper.  Just as I put my head up the hatchway
+the sheet of one of the sails, which was hanging loose in the still air,
+passed gently over my head and knocked my hat off.  At any other time I
+would have thought nothing of this, but Tom's story had thrown me into
+such an excited and nervous condition that I gave a start, missed my
+footing, uttered a loud cry, and fell down the ladder right in among the
+men with a tremendous crash, knocking over two or three oil-cans and a
+tin bread-basket in my fall, and upsetting the lantern, so that the
+place was instantly pitch dark.
+
+I never heard such a howl of terror as these men gave vent to when this
+misfortune befell me.  They rushed upon deck with their hearts in their
+mouths, tumbling, and peeling the skin off their shins and knuckles in
+their haste; and it was not until they heard the laughter of the watch
+on deck that they breathed freely, and, joining in the laugh, called
+themselves fools for being frightened by a ghost story.  I noticed,
+however, that, for all their pretended indifference, there was not one
+man among them--not even Tom Lokins himself--who would go down below to
+relight the lantern for at least a quarter of an hour afterwards!
+
+Feeling none the worse for my fall, I went forward and leaned over the
+bow of the ship, where I was much astonished by the appearance of the
+sea.  It seemed as if the water was on fire.  Every time the ship's bow
+rose and fell, the little belt of foam made in the water seemed like a
+belt of blue flame with bright sparkles in it, like stars or diamonds.
+I had seen this curious appearance before, but never so bright as it was
+on that night.
+
+"What is it, Tom?" said I, as my friend came forward and leaned over the
+ship's bulwark beside me.
+
+"It's blue fire, Bob," replied Tom, as he smoked his pipe calmly.
+
+"Come, you know I can't swallow that," said I; "everybody knows that
+fire, either blue or red, can't burn in the water."
+
+"Maybe not," returned Tom; "but it's blue fire for all that.  Leastwise
+if it's not, I don't know wot else it is."
+
+Tom had often seen this light before, no doubt, but he had never given
+himself the trouble to find out what it could be.  Fortunately the
+captain came up just as I put the question, and he enlightened me on the
+subject.
+
+"It is caused by small animals," said he, leaning over the side.
+
+"Small animals!" said I, in astonishment.
+
+"Ay, many parts of the sea are full of creatures so small and so thin
+and colourless, that you can hardly see them even in a clear glass
+tumbler.  Many of them are larger than others, but the most of them are
+very small."
+
+"But how do they shine like that, sir?"  I asked.
+
+"That I do not know, boy.  God has given them the power to shine, just
+as he has given us the power to walk or speak; and they do shine
+brightly, as you see; but _how_ they do it is more than I can tell.  I
+think, myself, it must be anger that makes them shine, for they
+generally do it when they are stirred up or knocked about by oars, or
+ships' keels, or tumbling waves.  But I am not sure that that's the
+reason either, because, you know, we often sail through them without
+seeing the light, though of course they must be there."
+
+"P'raps, sir," said Tom Lokins; "p'raps, sir, they're sleepy sometimes,
+an' can't be bothered gettin' angry."
+
+"Perhaps!" answered the captain, laughing.  "But then again, at other
+times, I have seen them shining over the whole sea when it was quite
+calm, making it like an ocean of milk; and nothing was disturbing them
+at that time, d'ye see."
+
+"I don' know _that_," objected Tom; "they might have bin a-fightin'
+among theirselves."
+
+"Or playing, may be," said I.
+
+The captain laughed, and, looking up at the sky, said, "I don't like the
+look of the weather, Tom Lokins.  You're a sharp fellow, and have been
+in these seas before, what say you?"
+
+"We'll have a breeze," replied Tom, briefly.
+
+"More than a breeze," muttered the captain, while a look of grave
+anxiety overspread his countenance; "I'll go below and take a squint at
+the glass."
+
+"What does he mean by that, Tom," said I, when the captain was gone, "I
+never saw a calmer or a finer night.  Surely there is no chance of a
+storm just now."
+
+"Ay, that shows that you're a young feller, and han't got much
+experience o' them seas," replied my companion.  "Why, boy, sometimes
+the fiercest storm is brewin' behind the greatest calm.  An' the worst
+o' the thing is that it comes so sudden at times, that the masts are
+torn out o' the ship before you can say Jack Robinson."
+
+"What! and without any warning?" said I.
+
+"Ay, _almost_ without warnin'; but not _altogether_ without it.  You
+heer'd the captain say he'd go an' take a squint at the glass?"
+
+"Yes; what is the glass?"
+
+"It's not a glass o' grog, you may be sure; nor yet a lookin'-glass.
+It's the weather-glass, boy.  Shore-goin' chaps call it a barometer."
+
+"And what's the meaning of barometer?"  I inquired earnestly.
+
+Tom Lokins stared at me in stupid amazement.
+
+"Why, boy," said he, "you're too inquisitive.  I once asked the doctor
+o' a ship that question, and says he to me, `Tom,' says he, `a barometer
+is a glass tube filled with quicksilver or mercury, which is a metal in
+a soft or fluid state, like water, you know, and it's meant for tellin'
+the state o' the weather.'
+
+"`Yes, sir,' I answers, `I know that, well enough.'
+
+"`Then why did you ask?' says he, gettin' into a passion.
+
+"`I asked what was the meanin' o' the _word_ barometer, sir,' said I.
+
+"The doctor he looked grave at that, and shook his head.  `Tom,' says
+he, `if I was to go for to explain that word, and all about the
+instrument, in a scientific sort o' way, d'ye see, I'd have to sit here
+an' speak to you right on end for six hours or more.'
+
+"`Oh, sir,' says I, `don't do it, then.  _Please_, don't do it.'
+
+"`No more I will,' says he; `but it'll serve your turn to know that a
+barometer is a glass for measurin' the weight o' the air, and, _somehow
+or other, that_ lets ye know wots a-coming.  If the mercury in the glass
+rises high, all's right.  If it falls uncommon low very sudden, look out
+for squalls; that's all.  No matter how smooth the sea may be, or how
+sweetly all natur' may smile, don't you believe it; take in every inch
+o' canvas at once.'"
+
+"That was a queer explanation, Tom."
+
+"Ay, but it was a true one, as you shall see before long."
+
+As I looked out upon the calm sea, which lay like a sheet of glass,
+without a ripple on its surface, I could scarcely believe what he had
+said.  But before many minutes had passed I was convinced of my error.
+
+While I was standing talking to my messmate, the captain rushed on deck,
+and shouted--
+
+"All hands tumble up!  Shorten sail!  Take in every rag!  Look alive,
+boys, look alive."
+
+I was quite stunned for a moment by this, and by the sudden tumult that
+followed.  The men, who seemed never to take thought about anything, and
+who had but one duty, namely, to _obey orders_, ran upon deck, and
+leaped up the rigging like cats; the sheets of nearly all the principal
+sails were clewed up, and, ere long, the canvas was made fast to the
+yards.  A few of the smaller sails only were left exposed, and even
+these were close reefed.  Before long a loud roar was heard, and in
+another minute the storm burst upon us with terrific violence.  The ship
+at first lay over so much that the masts were almost in the water, and
+it was as impossible for any one to walk the deck as to walk along the
+side of a wall.  At the same time, the sea was lashed into white foam,
+and the blinding spray flew over us in bitter fury.
+
+"Take in the topsails!" roared the captain.  But his voice was drowned
+in the shriek of the gale.  The men were saved the risk of going out on
+the yards, however, for in a few moments more all the sails, except the
+storm-try-sail, were burst and blown to ribbons.
+
+We now tried to put the ship's head to the wind and "_lay to_," by which
+landsmen will understand that we tried to face the storm, and remain
+stationary.  But the gale was so fierce that this was impossible.  The
+last rag of sail was blown away, and then there was nothing left for us
+but to show our stern to the gale, and "scud under bare poles."
+
+The great danger now was that we might be "pooped," which means that a
+huge wave might curl over our stern, fall with terrible fury on our
+deck, and sink us.
+
+Many and many a good ship has gone down in this way; but we were
+mercifully spared.  As our safety depended very much on good steering,
+the captain himself took the wheel, and managed the ship so well, that
+we weathered the gale without damage, farther than the loss of a few
+sails and light spars.  For two days the storm howled furiously, the sky
+and sea were like ink, with sheets of rain and foam driving through the
+air, and raging billows tossing our ship about like a cork.
+
+During all this time my shipmates were quiet and grave, but active and
+full of energy, so that every order was at once obeyed without noise or
+confusion.  Every man watched the slightest motion of the captain.  We
+all felt that everything depended on him.
+
+As for me, I gave up all hope of being saved.  It seemed impossible to
+me that anything that man could build could withstand so terrible a
+storm.  I do not pretend to say that I was not afraid.  The near
+prospect of a violent death caused my heart to sink more than once; but
+my feelings did not unman me.  I did my duty quietly, but quickly, like
+the rest; and when I had no work to do, I stood holding on to the
+weather stanchions, looking at the raging sea, and thinking of my
+mother, and of the words of kindness and counsel she had so often
+bestowed upon me in vain.
+
+The storm ceased almost as quickly as it began, and although the sea did
+not all at once stop the heavings of its angry bosom, the wind fell
+entirely in the course of a few hours, the dark clouds broke up into
+great masses that were piled up high into the sky, and out of the midst
+of these the glorious sun shone in bright rays down on the ocean, like
+comfort from heaven, gladdening our hearts as we busily repaired the
+damage that we had suffered from the storm.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE.
+
+OUR FIRST BATTLE.
+
+I shall never forget the surprise I got the first time I saw a whale.
+
+It was in the forenoon of a most splendid day, about a week after we
+arrived at that part of the ocean where we might expect to find fish.  A
+light nor'-east breeze was blowing, but it scarcely ruffled the sea, as
+we crept slowly through the water with every stitch of canvas set.
+
+As we had been looking out for fish for some time past, everything was
+in readiness for them.  The boats were hanging over the side ready to
+lower, tubs for coiling away the ropes, harpoons, lances, etcetera, all
+were ready to throw in, and start away at a moment's notice.  The man in
+the "crow's nest," as they call the cask fixed up at the mast-head, was
+looking anxiously out for whales, and the crew were idling about the
+deck.  Tom Lokins was seated on the windlass smoking his pipe, and I was
+sitting beside him on an empty cask, sharpening a blubber-knife.
+
+"Tom," said I, "what like is a whale?"
+
+"Why, it's like nothin' but itself," replied Tom, looking puzzled.
+"Why, wot a queer feller you are to ax questions."
+
+"I'm sure you've seen plenty of them.  You might be able to tell what a
+whale is like."
+
+"Wot it's like!  Well, it's like a tremendous big bolster with a head
+and a tail to it."
+
+"And how big is it?"
+
+"They're of all sizes, lad.  I've seen one that was exactly equal to
+three hundred fat bulls, and its rate of goin' would take it round the
+whole world in twenty-three days."
+
+"I don't believe you," said I, laughing.
+
+"Don't you?" cried Tom; "it's a fact notwithstandin', for the captain
+himself said so, and that's how I came to know it."
+
+Just as Tom finished speaking, the man in the crow's nest roared at the
+top of his voice, "There she blows!"
+
+That was the signal that a whale was in sight, and as it was the first
+time we had heard it that season, every man in the ship was thrown into
+a state of tremendous excitement.
+
+"There she blows!" roared the man again.
+
+"Where away?" shouted the captain.
+
+"About two miles right ahead."
+
+In another moment the utmost excitement prevailed on board.  Suddenly,
+while I was looking over the side, straining my eyes to catch a sight of
+the whale, which could not yet be seen by the men on deck, I saw a brown
+object appear in the sea, not twenty yards from the side of the ship;
+before I had time to ask what it was, a whale's head rose to the
+surface, and shot up out of the water.  The part of the fish that was
+visible above water could not have been less than thirty feet in length.
+It just looked as if our longboat had jumped out of the sea, and he was
+so near that I could see his great mouth quite plainly.  I could have
+tossed a biscuit on his back easily.  Sending two thick spouts of frothy
+water out of his blow-holes forty feet into the air with tremendous
+noise, he fell flat upon the sea with a clap like thunder, tossed his
+flukes, or tail, high into the air, and disappeared.
+
+I was so amazed at this sight that I could not speak.  I could only
+stare at the place where the huge monster had gone down.
+
+"Stand by to lower," shouted the captain.
+
+"Ay, ay, sir," replied the men, leaping to their appointed stations; for
+every man in a whale-ship has his post of duty appointed to him, and
+knows what to do when an order is given.
+
+"Lower away," cried the captain, whose face was now blazing with
+excitement.
+
+In a moment more three boats were in the water; the tubs, harpoons,
+etcetera, were thrown in, the men seized the oars, and away they went
+with a cheer.  I was in such a state of flutter that I scarce knew what
+I did; but I managed somehow or other to get into a boat, and as I was a
+strong fellow, and a good rower, I was allowed to pull.
+
+"There she blows!" cried the man in the crow's nest, just as we shot
+from the side of the ship.  There was no need to ask, "where away" this
+time.  Another whale rose and spouted not more than three hundred yards
+off, and before we could speak a third fish rose in another direction,
+and we found ourselves in the middle, of what is called a "school of
+whales."
+
+"Now, lads," said the captain, who steered the boat in which I rowed,
+"bend your backs, my hearties; that fish right ahead of us is a
+hundred-barrel whale for certain.  Give way, boys; we _must_ have that
+fish."
+
+There was no need to urge the men, for their backs were strained to the
+utmost, their faces were flushed, and the big veins in their necks
+swelled almost to bursting, with the tremendous exertion.
+
+"Hold hard," said the captain, in a low voice, for now that we were
+getting near our prey, we made as little noise as possible.
+
+The men at once threw their oars "apeak," as they say; that is, raised
+them straight up in the air, and waited for further orders.  We expected
+the whale would rise near to where we were, and thought it best to rest
+and look out.
+
+While we were waiting, Tom Lokins, who was harpooner of the boat, sat
+just behind me with all his irons ready.  He took this opportunity to
+explain to me that by a "hundred-barrel fish" is meant a fish that will
+yield a hundred-barrels of oil.  He further informed me that such a fish
+was a big one, though he had seen a few in the North-west Seas that had
+produced upwards of two hundred-barrels.
+
+I now observed that the other boats had separated, and each had gone
+after a different whale.  In a few minutes the fish we were in chase of
+rose a short distance off, and sent up two splendid water-spouts high
+into the air, thus showing that he was what the whalers call a "right"
+whale.  It is different from the sperm whale, which has only one
+blow-hole, and that a little one.
+
+We rowed towards it with all our might, and as we drew near, the captain
+ordered Tom Lokins to "stand up," so he at once laid in his oar, and
+took up the harpoon.  The harpoon is an iron lance with a barbed point.
+A whale-line is attached to it, and this line is coiled away in a tub.
+When we were within a few yards of the fish, which was going slowly
+through the water, all ignorant of the terrible foes who were pursuing
+him, Tom Lokins raised the harpoon high above his head, and darted it
+deep into its fat side just behind the left fin, and next moment the
+boat ran aground on the whale's back.
+
+"Stern all, for your lives!" roared the captain, who, before his order
+was obeyed, managed to give the creature two deep wounds with his lance.
+The lance has no barbs to its point, and is used only for wounding
+after the harpoon is fixed.
+
+The boat was backed off at once, but it had scarcely got a few yards
+away when the astonished fish whirled its huge body half out of the
+water, and, coming down with a tremendous clap, made off like lightning.
+
+The line was passed round a strong piece of wood called the
+"logger-head," and, in running out, it began to smoke, and nearly set
+the wood on fire.  Indeed, it would have done so, if a man had not kept
+constantly pouring water upon it.  It was needful to be very cautious in
+managing the line, for the duty is attended with great danger.  If any
+hitch should take place, the line is apt to catch the boat and drag it
+down bodily under the waves.  Sometimes a coil of it gets round a leg or
+an arm of the man who attends to it, in which case his destruction is
+almost certain.  Many a poor fellow has lost his life in this way.
+
+The order was now given to "hold on line."  This was done, and in a
+moment our boat was cleaving the blue water like an arrow, while the
+white foam curled from her bows.  I thought every moment we should be
+dragged under; but whenever this seemed likely to happen, the line was
+let run a bit, and the strain eased.  At last the fish grew tired of
+dragging us, the line ceased to run out, and Tom hauled in the slack,
+which another man coiled away in its tub.  Presently the fish rose to
+the surface, a short distance off our weather-bow.
+
+"Give way, boys! spring your oars," cried the captain; "another touch or
+two with the lance, and that fish is ours."
+
+The boat shot ahead, and we were about to dart a second harpoon into the
+whale's side, when it took to "sounding,"--which means, that it went
+straight down, head foremost, into the depths of the sea.  At that
+moment Tom Lokins uttered a cry of mingled anger and disappointment.  We
+all turned round and saw our shipmate standing with the slack line in
+his hand, and such an expression on his weather-beaten face, that I
+could scarce help laughing.  The harpoon had not been well fixed; it had
+lost its hold, and the fish was now free!
+
+"Gone!" exclaimed the captain, with a groan.
+
+I remember even yet the feeling of awful disappointment that came over
+me when I understood that we had lost the fish after all our trouble!  I
+could almost have wept with bitter vexation.  As for my comrades, they
+sat staring at each other for some moments quite speechless.  Before we
+could recover from the state into which this misfortune had thrown us,
+one of the men suddenly shouted, "Hallo! there's the mate's boat in
+distress."
+
+We turned at once, and, truly, there was no doubt of the truth of this,
+for, about half a mile off, we beheld our first mate's boat tearing over
+the sea like a small steamer.  It was fast to a fish, and two oars were
+set up on end to attract our attention.
+
+When a whale is struck, it sometimes happens that the whole of the line
+in a boat is run out.  When this is about to occur, it becomes necessary
+to hold on as much as can be done without running the boat under the
+water, and an oar is set up on end to show that assistance is required,
+either from the ship or from the other boats.  As the line grows less
+and less, another and another oar is hoisted to show that help must be
+sent quickly.  If no assistance can be sent, the only thing that remains
+to be done is to cut the line and lose the fish; but a whale-line, with
+its harpoon, is a very heavy loss, in addition to that of the fish, so
+that whalers are tempted to hold on a little too long sometimes.
+
+When we saw the mate's boat dashing away in this style, we forgot our
+grief at the loss of our whale in our anxiety to render assistance to
+our comrades, and we rowed towards them as fast as we could.
+Fortunately the whale changed its course, and came straight towards us,
+so that we ceased pulling, and waited till they came up.  As the boat
+came on I saw the foam curling up on her bows as she leaped and flew
+over the sea.  I could scarcely believe it possible that wood and iron
+could bear such a strain.  In a few minutes they were almost abreast of
+us.
+
+"You're holding too hard!" shouted the captain.
+
+"Lines all out!" roared the mate.
+
+They were past almost before these short sentences could be spoken.  But
+they had not gone twenty yards ahead of us when the water rushed in over
+the bow, and before we could utter a word the boat and crew were gone.
+Not a trace of them remained!  The horror of the moment had not been
+fully felt, however, when the boat rose to the surface keel up, and, one
+after another, the heads of the men appeared.  The line had fortunately
+broken, otherwise the boat would have been lost, and the entire crew
+probably would have gone to the bottom with her.
+
+We instantly pulled to the rescue, and were thankful to find that not a
+man was killed, though some of them were a little hurt, and all had
+received a terrible fright.  We next set to work to right the upset
+boat, an operation which was not accomplished without much labour and
+difficulty.
+
+Now, while we were thus employed, our third boat, which was in charge of
+the second mate, had gone after the whale that had caused us so much
+trouble, and, when we had got the boat righted and began to look about
+us, we found that she was fast to the fish about a mile to leeward.
+
+"Hurrah, lads!" cried the captain, "luck has not left us yet.  Give way,
+my hearties, pull like Britons! we'll get that fish yet."
+
+We were all dreadfully done up by this time, but the sight of a boat
+fast to a whale restored us at once, and we pulled away as stoutly as if
+we had only begun the day's work.  The whale was heading in the
+direction of the ship, and when we came up to the scene of action the
+second mate had just "touched the life"; in other words, he had driven
+the lance deep down into the whale's vitals.  This was quickly known by
+jets of blood being spouted up through the blow-holes.  Soon after, our
+victim went into its dying agonies, or, as whalemen say, "his flurry."
+
+This did not last long.  In a short time he rolled over dead.  We
+fastened a line to his tail, the three boats took the carcass in tow,
+and, singing a lively song, we rowed away to the ship.
+
+Thus ended our first battle with the whales.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR.
+
+"CUTTING-IN THE BLUBBER" AND "TRYING OUT THE OIL."
+
+The scene that took place on board ship after we caught our first fish
+was most wonderful.
+
+We commenced the operation of what is called "cutting-in," that is,
+cutting up the whale, and getting the fat or blubber hoisted in.  The
+next thing we did was to "try out" the oil, or melt down the fat in
+large iron pots brought with us for this purpose; and the change that
+took place in the appearance of the ship and the men when this began was
+very remarkable.
+
+When we left port our decks were clean, our sails white, our masts well
+scraped; the brass-work about the quarter-deck was well polished, and
+the men looked tidy and clean.  A few hours after our first whale had
+been secured alongside all this was changed.  The cutting up of the huge
+carcass covered the decks with oil and blood, making them so slippery
+that they had to be covered with sand to enable the men to walk about.
+Then the smoke of the great fires under the melting-pots begrimed the
+masts, sails, and cordage with soot.  The faces and hands of the men got
+so covered with oil and soot that it would have puzzled any one to say
+whether they were white or black.  Their clothes, too, became so dirty
+that it was impossible to clean them.  But, indeed, whalemen do not much
+mind this.  In fact, they take a pleasure in all the dirt that surrounds
+them, because it is a sign of success in the main object of their
+voyage.  The men in a _clean_ whale-ship are never happy.  When
+everything is filthy, and dirty, and greasy, and smoky, and black--
+decks, rigging, clothes, and person--it is then that the hearty laugh
+and jest and song are heard as the crew work busily, night and day, at
+their rough but profitable labour.
+
+The operations of "cutting-in" and "trying out" were matters of great
+interest to me the first time I saw them.
+
+After having towed our whale to the ship, cutting-in was immediately
+begun.  First, the carcass was secured near the head and tail with
+chains, and made fast to the ship; then the great blocks and ropes
+fastened to the main and foremast for hoisting in the blubber were
+brought into play.  When all was ready, the captain and the two mates,
+with Tom Lokins, got upon the whale's body, with long-handled sharp
+spades or digging-knives.  With these they fell to work cutting off the
+blubber.
+
+I was stationed at one of the hoisting ropes, and while we were waiting
+for the signal to "hoist away," I peeped over the side, and for the
+first time had a good look at the great fish.  When we killed it, so
+much of its body was down in the water that I could not see it very
+clearly, but now that it was lashed at full length alongside the ship,
+and I could look right down upon it, I began to understand more clearly
+what a large creature it was.  One thing surprised me much; the top of
+its head, which was rough and knotty like the bark of an old tree, was
+swarming with little crabs and barnacles, and other small creatures.
+The whale's head seemed to be their regular home!  This fish was by no
+means one of the largest kind, but being the first I had seen, I fancied
+it must be the largest fish in the sea.
+
+Its body was forty feet long, and twenty feet round at the thickest
+part.  Its head, which seemed to me a great, blunt, shapeless thing,
+like a clumsy old boat, was eight feet long from the tip to the
+blow-holes or nostrils; and these holes were situated on the back of the
+head, which at that part was nearly four feet broad.  The entire head
+measured about twenty-one feet round.  Its ears were two small holes, so
+small that it was difficult to discover them, and the eyes were also
+very small for so large a body, being about the same size as those of an
+ox.  The mouth was very large, and the under jaw had great ugly lips.
+
+When it was dying, I saw these lips close in once or twice on its fat
+cheeks, which it bulged out like the leather sides of a pair of gigantic
+bellows.  It had two fins, one on each side, just behind the head.  With
+these, and with its tail, the whale swims and fights.  Its tail is its
+most deadly weapon.  The flukes of this one measured thirteen feet
+across, and with one stroke of this it could have smashed our largest
+boat in pieces.  Many a boat has been sent to the bottom in this way.
+
+I remember hearing our first mate tell of a wonderful escape a comrade
+of his had in the Greenland Sea fishery.  A whale had been struck, and,
+after its first run, they hauled up to it again, and rowed so hard that
+they ran the boat right against it.  The harpooner was standing on the
+bow all ready, and sent his iron cleverly into the blubber.  In its
+agony the whale reared its tail high out of the water, and the flukes
+whirled for a moment like a great fan just above the harpooner's head.
+One glance up was enough to show him that certain death was descending.
+In an instant he dived over the side and disappeared.  Next moment the
+flukes came down on the part of the boat he had just left, and cut it
+clean off; the other part was driven into the waves, and the men were
+left swimming in the water.  They were all picked up, however, by
+another boat that was in company, and the harpooner was recovered with
+the rest.  His quick dive had been the saving of his life.
+
+I had not much time given me to study the appearance of this whale
+before the order was given to "hoist away!" so we went to work with a
+will.  The first part that came up was the huge lip, fastened to a large
+iron hook, called the blubber hook.  It was lowered into the
+blubber-room between decks, where a couple of men were stationed to stow
+the blubber away.  Then came the fins, and after them the upper-jaw,
+with the whalebone attached to it.  The "right" whale has no teeth like
+the sperm whale.  In place of teeth it has the well-known substance
+called whalebone, which grows from the roof of its mouth in a number of
+broad thin plates, extending from the back of the head to the snout.
+The lower edges of these plates of whalebone are split into thousands of
+hairs like bristles, so that the inside roof of a whale's mouth
+resembles an enormous blacking brush!  The object of this curious
+arrangement is to enable the whale to catch the little shrimps and small
+sea-blubbers, called "medusae," on which it feeds.  I have spoken before
+of these last as being the little creatures that gave out such a
+beautiful pale-blue light at night.  The whale feeds on them.  When he
+desires a meal he opens his great mouth and rushes into the midst of a
+shoal of medusae; the little things get entangled in thousands among the
+hairy ends of the whalebone, and when the monster has got a large enough
+mouthful, he shuts his lower-jaw and swallows what his net has caught.
+
+The wisdom as well as the necessity of this arrangement is very plain.
+Of course, while dashing through the sea in this fashion, with his mouth
+agape, the whale must keep his throat closed, else the water would rush
+down it and choke him.  Shutting his throat then, as he does, the water
+is obliged to flow out of his mouth as fast as it flows in; it is also
+spouted up through his blow-holes, and this with such violence that many
+of the little creatures would be swept out along with it, but for the
+hairy-ended whalebone which lets the sea-water out, but keeps the
+medusae in.
+
+Well, let us return to our "cutting-in."  After the upper-jaw came the
+lower-jaw and throat, with the tongue.  This last was an enormous mass
+of fat, about as large as an ox, and it weighed fifteen hundred or two
+thousand pounds.  After this was got in, the rest of the work was
+simple.  The blubber of the body was peeled off in great strips,
+beginning at the neck and being cut spirally towards the tail.  It was
+hoisted on board by the blocks, the captain and mates cutting, and the
+men at the windlass hoisting, and the carcass slowly turning round until
+we got an unbroken piece of blubber, reaching from the water to nearly
+as high as the mainyard-arm.  This mass was nearly a foot thick, and it
+looked like fat pork.  It was cut off close to the deck, and lowered
+into the blubber-room, where the two men stationed there attacked it
+with knives, cut it into smaller pieces, and stowed it away.  Then
+another piece was hoisted on board in the same fashion, and so on we
+went till every bit of blubber was cut off; and I heard the captain
+remark to the mate when the work was done, that the fish was a good fat
+one, and he wouldn't wonder if it turned out to be worth 300 pounds
+sterling.
+
+Now, when this process was going on, a new point of interest arose which
+I had not thought of before, although my messmate, Tom Lokins, had often
+spoken of it on the voyage out.  This was the arrival of great numbers
+of sea-birds.
+
+Tom had often told me of the birds that always keep company with
+whalers; but I had forgotten all about it, until I saw an enormous
+albatross come sailing majestically through the air towards us.  This
+was the largest bird I ever saw, and no wonder, for it is the largest
+bird that flies.  Soon after that, another arrived, and although we were
+more than a thousand miles from any shore, we were speedily scented out
+and surrounded by hosts of gonies, stinkards, haglets, gulls, pigeons,
+petrels, and other sea-birds, which commenced to feed on pieces of the
+whale's carcass with the most savage gluttony.  These birds were
+dreadfully greedy.  They had stuffed themselves so full in the course of
+a short time, that they flew heavily and with great difficulty.  No
+doubt they would have to take three or four days to digest that meal!
+
+Sharks, too, came to get their share of what was going.  But these
+savage monsters did not content themselves with what was thrown away;
+they were so bold as to come before our faces and take bites out of the
+whale's body.  Some of these sharks were eight and nine feet long, and
+when I saw them open their horrid jaws, armed with three rows of
+glistening white sharp teeth, I could well understand how easily they
+could bite off the leg of a man, as they often do when they get the
+chance.  Sometimes they would come right up on the whale's body with a
+wave, bite out great pieces of the flesh, turn over on their bellies,
+and roll off.
+
+While I was looking over the side during the early part of that day, I
+saw a very large shark come rolling up in this way close to Tom Lokins'
+legs.  Tom made a cut at him with his blubber-spade, but the shark
+rolled off in time to escape the blow.  And after all it would not have
+done him much damage, for it is not easy to frighten or take the life
+out of a shark.
+
+"Hand me an iron and line, Bob," said Tom, looking up at me.  "I've got
+a spite agin that feller.  He's been up twice already.  Ah! hand it down
+here, and two or three of ye stand by to hold on by the line.  There he
+comes, the big villain!"
+
+The shark came close to the side of the whale at that moment, and Tom
+sent the harpoon right down his throat.
+
+"Hold on hard," shouted Tom.
+
+"Ay, ay," replied several of the men as they held on to the line, their
+arms jerking violently as the savage fish tried to free itself.  We
+quickly reeved a line through a block at the fore yard-arm, and hauled
+it on deck with much difficulty.  The scene that followed was very
+horrible, for there was no killing the brute.  It threshed the deck with
+its tail, and snapped so fiercely with its tremendous jaws, that we had
+to keep a sharp look out lest it should catch hold of a leg.  At last
+its tail was cut off, the body cut open, and all the entrails taken out,
+yet even after this it continued to flap and thresh about the deck for
+some time, and the heart continued to contract for twenty minutes after
+it was taken out and pierced with a knife.
+
+I would not have believed this had I not seen it with my own eyes.  In
+case some of my readers may doubt its truth, I would remind them how
+difficult it is, to kill some of those creatures, with which we are all
+familiar.  The common worm, for instance, may be cut into a number of
+small pieces, and yet each piece remains alive for some time after.
+
+The skin of the shark is valued by the whalemen, because, when cleaned
+and dry, it is as good as sand-paper, and is much used in polishing the
+various things they make, out of whales' bones and teeth.
+
+When the last piece of blubber had been cut off our whale, the great
+chain that held it to the ship's side was cast off, and the now useless
+carcass sank like a stone, much to the sorrow of some of the smaller
+birds, which, having been driven away by their bigger comrades, had not
+fed so heartily as they wished, perhaps!  But what was loss to the gulls
+was gain to the sharks, which could follow the carcass down into the
+deep and devour it at their leisure.
+
+"Now, lads," cried the mate, when the remains had vanished, "rouse up
+the fires, look alive, my hearties!"
+
+"Ay, ay, sir," was the ready reply, cheerfully given, as every man
+sprang to his appointed duty.
+
+And so, having "cut in" our whale, we next proceeded to "try out" the
+oil.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE.
+
+A STORM, A MAN OVERBOARD, AND A RESCUE.
+
+The scenes in a whaleman's life are varied and very stirring.  Sometimes
+he is floating on the calm ocean, idling about the deck and whistling
+for a breeze, when all of a sudden the loud cry is heard, "There she
+blows!" and in a moment the boats are in the water, and he is engaged in
+all the toils of an exciting chase.  Then comes the battle with the
+great leviathan of the deep, with all its risks and dangers.  Sometimes
+he is unfortunate, the decks are clean, he has nothing to do.  At other
+times he is lucky, "cutting-in" and "trying out" engage all his energies
+and attention.  Frequently storms toss him on the angry deep, and show
+him, if he will but learn the lesson, how helpless a creature he is, and
+how thoroughly dependent at all times for life, safety, and success,
+upon the arm of God.
+
+"Trying out" the oil, although not so thrilling a scene as many a one in
+his career, is, nevertheless, extremely interesting, especially at
+night, when the glare of the fires in the try-works casts a deep red
+glow on the faces of the men, on the masts and sails, and even out upon
+the sea.
+
+The try-works consisted of two huge melting-pots fixed upon brick-work
+fireplaces between the fore and main masts.  While some of the men were
+down in the blubber-room cutting the "blanket-pieces," as the largest
+masses are called, others were pitching the smaller pieces on deck,
+where they were seized by two men who stood near a block of wood, called
+a "horse," with a mincing knife, to slash the junks so as to make them
+melt easily.  These were then thrown into the melting-pots by one of the
+mates, who kept feeding the fires with such "scraps" of blubber as
+remain after the oil is taken out.  Once the fires were fairly set
+agoing no other kind of fuel was required than "scraps" of blubber.  As
+the boiling oil rose it was baled into copper cooling-tanks.  It was the
+duty of two other men to dip it out of these tanks into casks, which
+were then headed up by our cooper, and stowed away in the hold.
+
+As the night advanced the fires became redder and brighter by contrast,
+the light shone and glittered on the decks, and, as we plied our dirty
+work, I could not help thinking, "what _would_ my mother say, if she
+could get a peep at me now?"
+
+The ship's crew worked and slept by watches, for the fires were not
+allowed to go out all night.  About midnight I sat down on the windlass
+to take a short rest, and began talking to one of the men, Fred Borders
+by name.  He was one of the quietest and most active men in the ship,
+and, being quite a young man, not more than nineteen, he and I drew to
+one another, and became very intimate.
+
+"I think we're goin' to have a breeze, Bob," said he, as a sharp puff of
+wind crossed the deck, driving the black smoke to leeward, and making
+the fire flare up in the try-works.
+
+"I hope it won't be a storm, then," said I, "for it will oblige us to
+put out the fires."
+
+Just then Tom Lokins came up, ordered Fred to go and attend to the
+fires, sat down opposite to me on the windlass, and began to "lay down
+the law" in regard to storms.
+
+"You see, Bob Ledbury," said he, beginning to fill his pipe, "young
+fellers like you don't know nothin' about the weather--'cause why?
+you've got no experience.  Now, I'll put you up to a dodge consarning
+this very thing."
+
+I never found out what was the dodge that Tom, in his wisdom, was to
+have put me up to, for at that moment the captain came on deck, and gave
+orders to furl the top-gallant sails.
+
+Three or four of us ran up the rigging like monkeys, and in a few
+minutes the sails were lashed to the yards.
+
+The wind now began to blow steadily from the nor'-west; but not so hard
+as to stop our try-works for more than an hour.  After that it blew
+stiff enough to raise a heavy sea, and we were compelled to slack the
+fires.  This was all the harm it did to us, however, for although the
+breeze was stiffish, it was nothing like a gale.
+
+As the captain and the first mate walked the quarter-deck together, I
+heard the former say to the latter, "I think we had as well take in a
+reef in the topsails.  All hereabouts the fishing-ground is good, we
+don't need to carry on."
+
+The order was given to reduce sail, and the men lay out on the topsail
+yards.  I noticed that my friend Fred Borders was the first man to
+spring up the shrouds and lay out on the main-top-sail yard.  It was so
+dark that I could scarcely see the masts.  While I was gazing up, I
+thought I observed a dark object drop from the yard; at the same moment
+there was a loud shriek, followed by a plunge in the sea.  This was
+succeeded by the sudden cry, "man overboard!" and instantly the whole
+ship was in an uproar.
+
+No one who has not heard that cry can understand the dreadful feelings
+that are raised in the human breast by it.  My heart at first seemed to
+leap into my mouth, and almost choke me.  Then a terrible fear, which I
+cannot describe, shot through me, when I thought it might be my comrade
+Fred Borders.  But these thoughts and feelings passed like lightning--in
+a far shorter time than it takes to write them down.  The shriek was
+still ringing in my ears, when the captain roared--
+
+"Down your helm! stand by to lower away the boats."
+
+At the same moment he seized a light hen-coop and tossed it overboard,
+and the mate did the same with an oar in the twinkling of an eye.
+Almost without knowing what I did, or why I did it, I seized a great
+mass of oakum and rubbish that lay on the deck saturated with oil, I
+thrust it into the embers of the fire in the try-works and hurled it
+blazing into the sea.
+
+The ship's head was thrown into the wind, and we were brought to as
+quickly as possible.  A gleam of hope arose within me on observing that
+the mass I had thrown overboard continued still to burn; but when I saw
+how quickly it went astern, notwithstanding our vigorous efforts to stop
+the ship, my heart began to sink, and when, a few moments after, the
+light suddenly disappeared, despair seized upon me, and I gave my friend
+up for lost.
+
+At that moment, strange to say, thoughts of my mother came into my mind,
+but there was no time to be lost, and I threw myself, with a good deal
+of energy, into the first boat that was lowered, and pulled at the oar
+as if my own life depended on it.
+
+A lantern had been fastened to the end of an oar and set up in the boat,
+and by its faint light I could see that the men looked very grave.  Tom
+Lokins was steering, and I sat near him, pulling the aft oar.
+
+"Do you think we've any chance, Tom?" said I.
+
+A shake of the head was his only reply.
+
+"It must have been here away," said the mate, who stood up in the bow
+with a coil of rope at his feet, and a boat-hook in his hand.  "Hold on,
+lads, did any one hear a cry?"
+
+No one answered.  We all ceased pulling, and listened intently; but the
+noise of the waves and the whistling of the winds were all the sounds we
+heard.
+
+"What's that floating on the water?" said one of the men, suddenly.
+
+"Where away?" cried every one eagerly.
+
+"Right off the lee-bow--there, don't you see it?"
+
+At that moment a faint cry came floating over the black water, and died
+away in the breeze.
+
+The single word "Hurrah!" burst from our throats with all the power of
+our lungs, and we bent to our oars till we well-nigh tore the rollocks
+out of the boat.
+
+"Hold hard! stern all!" roared the mate, as we went flying down to
+leeward, and almost ran over the hen-coop, to which a human form was
+seen to be clinging with the tenacity of a drowning man.  We had swept
+down so quickly that we shot past it.  In an agony of fear lest my
+friend should be again lost in the darkness, I leaped up and sprang into
+the sea.  Tom Lokins, however, had noticed what I was about; he seized
+me by the collar of my jacket, just as I reached the water, and held me
+with a grip like a vice till one of the men came to his assistance, and
+dragged me back into the boat.  In a few moments more we reached the
+hen-coop, and Fred was saved!
+
+He was half dead with cold and exhaustion, poor fellow, but in a few
+minutes he began to recover, and before we reached the ship he could
+speak.  His first words were to thank God for his deliverance.  Then he
+added--
+
+"And, thanks to the man that flung that light overboard.  I should have
+gone down but for that.  It showed me where the hen-coop was."
+
+I cannot describe the feeling of joy that filled my heart when he said
+this.
+
+"Ay, who wos it that throw'd that fire overboard?" inquired one of the
+men.
+
+"Don't know," replied another, "I think it wos the cap'n."
+
+"You'll find that out when we get aboard," cried the mate; "pull away,
+lads."
+
+In five minutes Fred Borders was passed up the side and taken down
+below.  In two minutes more we had him stripped naked, rubbed dry,
+wrapped in hot blankets, and set down on one of the lockers, with a hot
+brick at his feet.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX.
+
+THE WHALE--FIGHTING BULLS, ETCETERA.
+
+As the reader may, perhaps, have been asking a few questions about the
+whale in his own mind, I shall try to answer them, by telling a few
+things concerning that creature which, I think, are worth knowing.
+
+In the first place, the whale is not a fish!  I have applied that name
+to it, no doubt, because it is the custom to do so; but there are great
+differences between the whales and the fishes.  The mere fact that the
+whale lives in water is not sufficient to prove it to be a fish.  The
+frog lives very much in water--he is born in the water, and, when very
+young, he lives in it altogether--would die, in fact, if he were taken
+out of it; yet a frog is not a fish.
+
+The following are some of the differences existing between a whale and a
+fish:--
+
+The whale is a warm-blooded animal; the fish is cold-blooded.  The whale
+brings forth its young alive; while most fishes lay eggs or spawn.
+Moreover, the fish lives entirely under water, but the whale cannot do
+so.  He breathes air through enormous lungs, not gills.  If you were to
+hold a whale's head under water for much longer than an hour, it would
+certainly be drowned; and this is the reason why it comes so frequently
+to the surface of the sea to take breath.  Whales seldom stay more than
+an hour under water, and when they come up to breathe, they discharge
+the last breath they took through their nostrils or blow-holes, mixed
+with large quantities of water, which they have taken in while feeding.
+But the most remarkable point of difference between the whale and fishes
+of all kinds is, that it suckles its young.
+
+The calf of one kind of whale is about fourteen feet long when it is
+born, and it weighs about a ton.  The cow-whale usually has only one
+calf at a time, and the manner in which she behaves to her gigantic baby
+shows that she is affected by feelings of anxiety and affection such as
+are never seen in fishes, which heartless creatures forsake their eggs
+when they are laid, and I am pretty sure they would not know their own
+children if they happened to meet with them.
+
+The whale, on the contrary, takes care of her little one, gives it suck,
+and sports playfully with it in the waves; its enormous heart throbbing
+all the while, no doubt, with satisfaction.
+
+I have heard of a whale which was once driven into shoal water with its
+calf and nearly stranded.  The huge dam seemed to become anxious for the
+safety of her child, for she was seen to swim eagerly round it, embrace
+it with her fins, and roll it over in the waves, trying to make it
+follow her into deep water.  But the calf was obstinate; it would not
+go, and the result was that the boat of a whaler pulled up and harpooned
+it.  The poor little whale darted away like lightning on receiving the
+terrible iron, and ran out a hundred fathoms of line; but it was soon
+overhauled and killed.  All this time the dam kept close to the side of
+its calf, and not until a harpoon was plunged into her own side would
+she move away.  Two boats were after her.  With a single rap of her tail
+she cut one of the boats in two, and then darted off.  But in a short
+time she turned and came back.  Her feelings of anxiety had returned, no
+doubt, after the first sting of pain was over, and she died at last,
+close to the side of her young one.
+
+There are various kinds of whales, but the two sorts that are most
+sought after are the common whale of the Greenland Seas, which is called
+the "right whale," and the sperm whale of the South Sea.  Both kinds are
+found in the south; but the sperm whale never goes to the North Seas.
+Both kinds grow to an enormous size--sometimes to seventy feet in
+length, but there is considerable difference in their appearance,
+especially about the head.  In a former chapter I have partly described
+the head of a _right_ whale, which has whalebone instead of teeth, with
+its blow-holes on the back of the head.  The sperm whale has large white
+teeth in its lower-jaw and none at all in the upper.  It has only one
+blow-hole, and that a little one, much farther forward on its head, so
+that sailors can tell, at a great distance, what kind of whales they
+see, simply by their manner of spouting.
+
+The most remarkable feature about the sperm whale is the bluntness of
+its clumsy head, which looks somewhat like a big log with the end sawn
+square off, and this head is about one-third of its entire body.
+
+The sperm whale feeds differently from the right whale.  He seizes his
+prey with his powerful teeth, and lives, to a great extent, on large
+cuttlefish.  Some of them have been seen to vomit lumps of these
+cuttlefish as long as a whale-boat.  He is much fiercer, too, than the
+right whale, which almost always takes to flight when struck, but the
+sperm whale will sometimes turn on its foes, and smash their boat with a
+blow of his blunt head or tail.
+
+Fighting-whales, as they are called, are not uncommon.  These are
+generally old bulls, which have become wise from experience, and give
+the whalers great trouble--sometimes carrying away several harpoons and
+lines.  The lower-jaw of one old bull of this kind was found to be
+sixteen feet long, and it had forty-eight teeth, some of them a foot
+long.  A number of scars about his head showed that this fellow had been
+in the wars.  When two bull-whales take to fighting, their great effort
+is to catch each other by the lower-jaw, and, when locked together, they
+struggle with a degree of fury that cannot be described.
+
+It is not often that the sperm whale actually attacks a ship; but there
+are a few cases of this kind which cannot be doubted.  The following
+story is certainly true; and while it shows how powerful a creature the
+whale is, it also shows what terrible risk and sufferings the whaleman
+has frequently to encounter.
+
+In the month of August 1819, the American whale-ship _Essex_ sailed from
+Nantucket for the Pacific Ocean.  She was commanded by Captain Pollard.
+Late in the autumn of the same year, when in latitude 40 degrees of the
+South Pacific, a shoal, or "school," of sperm whales was discovered, and
+three boats were immediately lowered and sent in pursuit.  The mate's
+boat was struck by one of the fish during the chase, and it was found
+necessary to return to the ship to repair damages.
+
+While the men were employed at this, an enormous whale suddenly rose
+quite close to the ship.  He was going at nearly the same rate with the
+ship--about three miles an hour; and the men, who were good judges of
+the size of whales, thought that it could not have been less than
+eighty-five feet long.  All at once he ran against the ship, striking
+her bows, and causing her to tremble like a leaf.  The whale immediately
+dived and passed under the ship, and grazed her keel in doing so.  This
+evidently hurt his back, for he suddenly rose to the surface about fifty
+yards off, and commenced lashing the sea with his tail and fins as if
+suffering great agony.  It was truly an awful sight to behold that great
+monster lashing the sea into foam at so short a distance.
+
+In a short time he seemed to recover, and started off at great speed to
+windward.  Meanwhile the men discovered that the blow received by the
+ship had done her so much damage, that she began to fill and settle down
+at the bows; so they rigged the pumps as quickly as possible.  While
+working them one of the men cried out--
+
+"God have mercy! he comes again!"
+
+This was too true.  The whale had turned, and was now bearing down on
+them at full speed, leaving a white track of foam behind him.  Rushing
+at the ship like a battering-ram, he hit her fair on the weather bow,
+and stove it in, after which he dived and disappeared.  The horrified
+men took to their boats at once, and in _ten minutes_ the ship went
+down.
+
+The condition of the men thus left in three open boats far out upon the
+sea, without provisions or shelter, was terrible indeed.  Some of them
+perished, and the rest, after suffering the severest hardships, reached
+a low island called Ducies, on the 20th of December.  It was a mere
+sand-bank, which supplied them only with water and seafowl.  Still even
+this was a mercy, for which they had reason to thank God; for in cases
+of this kind one of the evils that seamen have most cause to dread is
+the want of water.
+
+Three of the men resolved to remain on this sand-bank, for dreary and
+uninhabited though it was, they preferred to take their chance of being
+picked up by a passing ship rather than run the risks of crossing the
+wide ocean in open boats, so their companions bade them a sorrowful
+farewell, and left them.  But this island is far out of the usual track
+of ships.  The poor fellows have never since been heard of.
+
+It was the 27th of December when the three boats left the sand-bank with
+the remainder of the men, and began a voyage of two thousand miles,
+towards the island of Juan Fernandez.  The mate's boat was picked up,
+about three months after, by the ship _Indian_ of London, with only
+three living men in it.  About the same time the captain's boat was
+discovered, by the _Dauphin_ of Nantucket, with only two men living; and
+these unhappy beings had only sustained life by feeding on the flesh of
+their dead comrades.  The third boat must have been lost, for it was
+never heard of; and out of the whole crew of twenty men, only five
+returned home to tell their eventful story.
+
+Before resuming the thread of my narrative, I must not omit to mention,
+that in the head of the sperm whale there is a large cavity or hole
+called the "case," which contains pure oil that does not require to be
+melted, but can be bailed at once into casks and stowed away.  This is
+the valuable spermaceti from which the finest candles are made.  One
+whale will sometimes yield fifteen barrels of spermaceti oil from the
+"case" of its head.  A large fish will produce from eighty to a
+hundred-barrels of oil altogether, sometimes much more; and when
+whalemen converse with each other, about the size of whales, they speak
+of "eighty-barrel fish," and so on.
+
+Although I have written much about the fighting powers of the sperm
+whale, it must not be supposed that whales are by nature fond of
+fighting.  On the contrary, the "right" whale is a timid creature, and
+never shows fight, except in defence of its young.  And the sperm whale
+generally takes to flight when pursued.  In fact, most of the accidents
+that happen to whalemen occur when the wounded monster is lashing the
+water in blind terror and agony.
+
+The whale has three bitter enemies, much smaller, but much bolder than
+himself, and of these he is terribly afraid.  They are the swordfish,
+the thrasher, and the killer.  The first of these, the swordfish, has a
+strong straight horn or sword projecting from his snout, with which he
+boldly attacks and pierces the whale.  The thrasher is a strong fish,
+twenty feet long, and of great weight.  Its method of attack is to leap
+out of the water on the whale's back, and deal it a tremendous blow with
+its powerful tail.
+
+The swordfish and thrasher sometimes act together in the attack; the
+first stabbing him below, and the second belabouring him above, while
+the whale, unable, or too frightened, to fight, rushes through the
+water, and even leaps its whole gigantic length into the air in its
+endeavours to escape.  When a whale thus leaps his whole length out of
+the water, the sailors say he "breaches," and breaching is a common
+practice.  They seem to do it often for amusement as well as from
+terror.
+
+But the most deadly of the three enemies is the killer.  This is itself
+a kind of small whale, but it is wonderfully strong, swift, and bold.
+When one of the killers gets into the middle, of a school of whales, the
+frightened creatures are seen flying in all directions.  His mode of
+attack is to seize his big enemy by the jaw, and hold on until he is
+exhausted and dies.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN.
+
+TOM'S WISDOM--ANOTHER GREAT BATTLE.
+
+One day I was standing beside the windlass, listening to the
+conversation of five or six of the men, who were busy sharpening
+harpoons and cutting-knives, or making all kinds of toys and things out
+of whales' bones.  We had just finished cutting-in and trying out our
+third whale, and as it was not long since we reached the fishing-ground,
+we were in high hopes of making a good thing of it that season; so that
+every one was in good spirits, from the captain down to the youngest man
+in the ship.
+
+Tom Lokins was smoking his pipe, and Tom's pipe was an uncommonly black
+one, for he smoked it very often.  Moreover, Tom's pipe was uncommonly
+short, so short that I always wondered how he escaped burning the end of
+his nose.  Indeed, some of the men said that the redness of the end of
+Tom's nose was owing to its being baked like a brick by the heat of his
+pipe.  Tom took this pipe from his mouth, and while he was pushing down
+the tobacco with the end of his little finger, he said--
+
+"D'ye know, lads, I've been thinkin'--"
+
+"No, have ye?" cried one of the men, interrupting him with a look of
+pretended surprise.  "Well now, I do think, messmates, that we should ax
+the mate to make a note o' that in the log, for it's not often that Tom
+Lokins takes to thinkin'."
+
+There was a laugh at this, but Tom, turning with a look of contempt to
+the man who interrupted him, replied--
+
+"I'll tell you wot it is, Bill Blunt, if all the thoughts that _you_
+think, and especially the jokes that you utter, wos put down in the log,
+they'd be so heavy that I do believe they would sink the ship!"
+
+"Well, well," cried Bill, joining in the laugh against himself, "if they
+did, _your_ jokes would be so light and triflin' that I do believe
+they'd float her again.  But what have you been a-thinkin' of, Tom?"
+
+"I've been thinkin'," said Tom slowly, "that if a whale makes his
+breakfast entirely off them little things that you can hardly see when
+you get 'em into a tumbler--I forget how the captain calls 'em--wot a
+_tree-mendous_ heap of 'em he must eat in the course of a year!"
+
+"Thousands of 'em, I suppose," said one of the men.
+
+"Thousands!" cried Tom, "I should rather say billions of them."
+
+"How much is billions, mate?" inquired Bill.
+
+"I don't know," answered Tom.  "Never could find out.  You see it's
+heaps upon heaps of thousands, for the thousands come first and the
+billions afterwards; but when I've thought uncommon hard, for a long
+spell at a time, I always get confused, because millions comes in
+between, d'ye see, and that's puzzlin'."
+
+"I think I could give you some notion about these things," said Fred
+Borders, who had been quietly listening all the time, but never putting
+in a word, for, as I have said, Fred was a modest bashful man and seldom
+spoke much.  But we had all come to notice that when Fred spoke, he had
+always something to say worth hearing; and when he did speak he spoke
+out boldly enough.  We had come to have feelings of respect for our
+young shipmate, for he was a kind-hearted lad, and we saw by his
+conversation that he had been better educated than the most of us, so
+all our tongues stopped as the eyes of the party turned on him.
+
+"Come, Fred, let's hear it then," said Tom.
+
+"It's not much I have to tell," began Fred, "but it may help to make
+your minds clearer on this subject.  On my first voyage to the
+whale-fishery (you know, lads, this is my second voyage) I went to the
+Greenland Seas.  We had a young doctor aboard with us--quite a youth;
+indeed he had not finished his studies at college, but he was cleverer,
+for all that, than many an older man that had gone through his whole
+course.  I do believe that the reason of his being so clever was, that
+he was for ever observing things, and studying them, and making notes,
+and trying to find out reasons.  He was never satisfied with knowing a
+thing; he must always find out _why_ it was.  One day I heard him ask
+the captain what it was that made the sea so green in some parts of
+those seas.  Our captain was an awfully stupid man.  So long as he got
+plenty of oil he didn't care two straws for the reason of anything.  The
+young doctor had been bothering him that morning with a good many
+questions, so when he asked him what made the sea green, he answered
+sharply, `I suppose it makes itself green, young man,' and then he
+turned from him with a fling.
+
+"The doctor laughed, and came forward among the men, and began to tell
+us stories and ask questions.  Ah! he was a real hearty fellow; he would
+tell you all kinds of queer things, and would pump you dry of all you
+knew in no time.  Well, but the thing I was going to tell you was this.
+One of the men said to him he had heard that the greenness of the
+Greenland Sea, was caused by the little things like small bits of jelly,
+on which the whales feed.  As soon as he heard this he got a bucket and
+hauled some sea-water aboard, and for the next ten days he was never
+done working away with the sea-water; pouring it into tumblers and
+glasses; looking through it by daylight and by lamplight; tasting it,
+and boiling it, and examining it with a microscope."
+
+"What's a microscope?" inquired one of the men.
+
+"Don't you know?" said Tom Lokins, "why it's a glass that makes little
+things seem big, when ye look through it.  I've heerd say that beasts
+that are so uncommon small that you can't see them at all are made to
+come into sight, and look quite big, by means o' this glass.  But I
+can't myself say that it's true."
+
+"But I can," said Fred, "for I have seen it with my own eyes.  Well,
+after a good while, I made bold to ask the young doctor what he had
+found out.
+
+"`I've found,' said he, `that the greenness of these seas is in truth
+caused by uncountable numbers of medusae--'"
+
+"Ha! that's the word," shouted Tom Lokins, "Medoosy, that's wot the
+captain calls 'em.  Heave ahead, Fred."
+
+"Well, then," continued Fred, "the young doctor went on to tell me that
+he had been counting the matter to himself very carefully, and he found
+that in every square mile of sea-water there were living about eleven
+quadrillions, nine hundred and ninety-nine trillions of these little
+creatures!"
+
+"Oh! hallo! come now!" we all cried, opening our eyes very wide indeed.
+
+"But, I say, how much is that?" inquired Tom Lokins.
+
+"Ah! that's just what I said to the young doctor, and he said to me,
+`I'll tell you what, Fred Borders, no man alive understands how much
+that is, and what's more, no man ever will; but I'll give you _some
+notion_ of what it means;' and so he told me how long it would take
+forty thousand men to count that number of eleven quadrillions, nine
+hundred and ninety-nine trillions, each man of the forty thousand
+beginning `one,' `two,' `three,' and going on till the sum of the whole
+added together would make it up.  Now, how long d'ye think it would take
+them?--guess."
+
+Fred Borders smiled as he said this, and looked round the circle of men.
+
+"I know," cried one, "it would take the whole forty thousand a _week_ to
+do it."
+
+"Oh! nonsense, they could do it easy in two days," said another.
+
+"That shows how little you know about big numbers," observed Tom Lokins,
+knocking the ashes out of his pipe.  "I'm pretty sure it couldn't be
+done in much less than six months; workin' hard all day, and makin'
+allowance for only one hour off for dinner."
+
+"You're all wrong, shipmates," said Fred Borders.  "That young doctor
+told me that if they'd begun work at the day of creation they would only
+have just finished the job last year!"
+
+"Oh! gammon, you're jokin'," cried Bill Blunt.
+
+"No, I'm not," said Fred, "for I was told afterwards by an old clergyman
+that the young doctor was quite right, and that any one who was good at
+'rithmetic could work the thing out for himself in less than
+half-an-hour."
+
+Just as Fred said this there came a loud cry from the mast-head that
+made us all spring to our feet like lightning.
+
+"There she blows!  There she breaches!"
+
+The captain was on deck in a moment.
+
+"Where away?" he cried.
+
+"On the lee beam, sir.  Sperm whale, about two miles off.  There she
+blows!"
+
+Every man was at his station in a moment; for, after being some months
+out, we became so used to the work, that we acted together like a piece
+of machinery.  But our excitement never abated in the least.
+
+"Sing out when the ship heads for her."
+
+"Ay, ay, sir."
+
+"Keep her away!" said the captain to the man at the helm.  "Bob Ledbury,
+hand me the spyglass."
+
+"Steady," from the mast-head.
+
+"Steady it is," answered the man at the helm.
+
+While we were all looking eagerly out ahead we heard a thundering snore
+behind us, followed by a heavy splash.  Turning quickly round, we saw
+the flukes of an enormous whale sweeping through the air not more than
+six hundred yards astern of us.
+
+"Down your helm," roared the captain; "haul up the mainsail, and square
+the yards.  Call all hands."
+
+"All hands, ahoy!" roared Bill Blunt, in a voice of thunder, and in
+another moment every man in the ship was on deck.
+
+"Hoist and swing the boats," cried the captain.  "Lower away."
+
+Down went the boats into the water; the men were into their places
+almost before you could wink, and we pulled away from the ship just as
+the whale rose the second time, about half a mile away to leeward.
+
+From the appearance of this whale we felt certain that it was one of the
+largest we had yet seen, so we pulled after it with right good will.  I
+occupied my usual place in the captain's boat, next the bow-oar, just
+beside Tom Lokins, who was ready with his harpoons in the bow.  Young
+Borders pulled the oar directly in front of me.  The captain himself
+steered, and, as our crew was a picked one, we soon left the other two
+boats behind us.
+
+Presently a small whale rose close beside us, and, sending a shower of
+spray over the boat, went down in a pool of foam.  Before we had time to
+speak, another whale rose on the opposite side of the boat, and then
+another on our starboard bow.  We had got into the middle of a shoal of
+whales, which commenced leaping and spouting all round us, little aware
+of the dangerous enemy that was so near.
+
+In a few minutes more, up comes the big one again that we had first
+seen.  He seemed very active and wild.  After blowing on the surface
+once or twice, about a quarter of a mile off, he peaked his flukes, and
+pitched down head foremost.
+
+"Now then, lads, he's down for a long dive," said the captain; "spring
+your oars like men, we'll get that fish for certain, if you'll only
+pull."
+
+The captain was mistaken; the whale had only gone down deep in order to
+come up and breach, or spring out of the water, for the next minute he
+came up not a hundred yards from us, and leaped his whole length into
+the air.
+
+A shout of surprise broke from the men, and no wonder, for this was the
+largest fish I ever saw or heard of, and he came up so clear of the
+water, that we could see him from head to tail, as he turned over in the
+air, exposing his white belly to view, and came down on his great side
+with a crash like thunder, that might have been heard six miles off.  A
+splendid mass of pure white spray burst from the spot where he fell, and
+in another moment he was gone.
+
+"I do believe it's _New Zealand Tom_," cried Bill Blunt, referring to an
+old bull whale that had become famous among the men who frequented these
+seas, for its immense size and fierceness, and for the great trouble it
+had given them, smashing some of their boats, and carrying away many of
+their harpoons.
+
+"I don't know whether it's New Zealand Tom or not," said the captain,
+"but it's pretty clear that he's an old sperm bull.  Give way, lads, we
+must get that whale, whatever it should cost us."
+
+We did not need a second bidding; the size of the fish was so great that
+we felt more excited than we had yet been during the voyage, so we bent
+our oars till we almost pulled the boat out of the water.  The other
+boats had got separated, chasing the little whales, so we had this one
+all to ourselves.
+
+"There she blows!" said Tom Lokins, in a low voice, as the fish came up
+a short distance astern of us.
+
+We had overshot our mark, so, turning about, we made for the whale,
+which kept for a considerable time near the top of the water, spouting
+now and then, and going slowly to windward.  We at last got within a few
+feet of the monster, and the captain suddenly gave the word, "Stand up."
+
+This was to our harpooner, Tom Lokins, who jumped up on the instant, and
+buried two harpoons deep in the blubber.
+
+"Stern all!" was the next word, and we backed off with all our might.
+It was just in time, for, in his agony, the whale tossed his tail right
+over our heads, the flukes were so big that they could have completely
+covered the boat, and he brought them down flat on the sea with a clap
+that made our ears tingle, while a shower of spray drenched us to the
+skin.  For one moment I thought it was all over with us, but we were
+soon out of immediate danger, and lay on our oars watching the writhings
+of the wounded monster as he lashed the ocean into foam.  The water all
+round us soon became white like milk, and the foam near the whale was
+red with blood.
+
+Suddenly this ceased, and, before we could pull up to lance him, he went
+down, taking the line out at such a rate that the boat spun round, and
+sparks of fire flew from the logger-head, from the chafing of the rope.
+
+"Hold on!" cried the captain, and next moment we were tearing over the
+sea at a fearful rate, with a bank of white foam rolling before us, high
+above our bows, and away on each side of us like the track of a steamer,
+so that we expected it every moment to rush in-board and swamp us.  I
+had never seen anything like this before.  From the first I had a kind
+of feeling that some evil would befall us.
+
+While we were tearing over the water in this way, we saw the other
+whales coming up every now and then, and blowing quite near to us, and
+presently we passed close enough to the first mate's boat to see that he
+was fast to a fish, and unable, therefore, to render us help if we
+should need it.
+
+In a short time the line began to slack, so we hauled it in hand over
+hand, and Tom Lokins coiled it away in the tub in the stern of the boat,
+while the captain took his place in the bow to be ready with the lance.
+The whale soon came up, and we pulled with all our might towards him.
+Instead of making off again, however, he turned round and made straight
+at the boat.  I now thought that destruction was certain, for, when I
+saw his great blunt forehead coming down on us like a steamboat, I felt
+that we could not escape.  I was mistaken.  The captain received him on
+the point of his lance, and the whale has such a dislike to pain, that
+even a small prick will sometimes turn him.
+
+For some time we kept dodging round this fellow; but he was so old and
+wise, that he always turned his head to us, and prevented us from
+getting a chance to lance him.  At last he turned a little to one side,
+and the captain plunged the lance deep into his vitals.
+
+"Ha! that's touched his life," cried Tom, as a stream of blood flew up
+from his blow-holes, a sure sign that he was mortally wounded.  But he
+was not yet conquered.  After receiving the cruel stab with the lance,
+he pitched right down, head foremost, and once more the line began to
+fly out over the bow.  We tried to hold on, but he was going so straight
+down that the boat was almost swamped, and we had to slack off to
+prevent our being pulled under water.
+
+Before many yards of the line had run out, one of the coils in the tub
+became entangled.
+
+"Look out, lads," cried Tom, and at once throwing the turn off the
+logger-head, he made an attempt to clear it.  The captain, in trying to
+do the same thing, slipped and fell.  Seeing this, I sprang up, and,
+grasping the coil as it flew past, tried to clear it.  Before I could
+think, a turn whipped round my left wrist.  I felt a wrench as if my arm
+had been torn out of the socket, and in a moment I was overboard, [see
+frontispiece] going down with almost lightning speed into the depths of
+the sea.  Strange to say, I did not lose my presence of mind.  I knew
+exactly what had happened.  I felt myself rushing down, down, down, with
+terrific speed; a stream of fire seemed to be whizzing past my eyes;
+there was a dreadful pressure on my brain, and a roaring, as if of
+thunder, in my ears.  Yet, even in that dread moment, thoughts of
+eternity, of my sins, and of meeting with my God, flashed into my mind,
+for thought is quicker than the lightning flash.
+
+Of a sudden the roaring ceased, and I felt myself buffeting the water
+fiercely in my efforts to reach the surface.  I know not how I got free,
+but I suppose the turn of the line must have slackened off somehow.  All
+this happened within the space of a few brief moments; but oh! they
+seemed fearfully long to me.  I do not think I could have held my breath
+a second longer.
+
+When I came to the surface, and tried to look about me, I saw the boat
+not more than fifty yards off, and, being a good swimmer, I struck out
+for it, although I felt terribly exhausted.  In a few minutes my
+comrades saw me, and, with a cheer put out the oars and began to row
+towards me.  I saw that the line was slack, and that they were hauling
+it in--a sign that the whale had ceased running and would soon come to
+the surface again.  Before they had pulled half-a-dozen strokes I saw
+the water open close beside the boat, and the monstrous head of the
+whale shot up like a great rock rising out of the deep.
+
+He was not more than three feet from the boat, and he came up with such
+force, that more than half his gigantic length came out of the water
+right over the boat.  I heard the captain's loud cry--"_Stern all_!"
+But it was too late, the whole weight of the monster's body fell upon
+the boat; there was a crash and a terrible cry, as the whale and boat
+went down together.
+
+For a few moments he continued to lash the sea in his fury, and the
+fragments of the boat floated all round him.  I thought that every man,
+of course, had been killed; but one after another their heads appeared
+in the midst of blood and foam, and they struck out for oars and pieces
+of the wreck.
+
+Providentially, the whale, in his tossings, had shot a little away from
+the spot, else every man must certainly have been killed.
+
+A feeling of horror filled my heart, as I beheld all this, and thought
+upon my position.  Fortunately, I had succeeded in reaching a broken
+plank; for my strength was now so much exhausted, that I could not have
+kept my head above water any longer without its assistance.  Just then I
+heard a cheer, and the next time I rose on the swell, I looked quickly
+round and saw the mate's boat making for the scene of action as fast as
+a stout and willing crew could pull.  In a few minutes more I was
+clutched by the arm, and hauled into it.  My comrades were next rescued,
+and we thanked God when we found that none were killed, although one of
+them had got a leg broken, and another an arm twisted out of joint.
+They all, however, seemed to think that my escape was much more
+wonderful than theirs; but I cannot say that I agreed with them in this.
+
+We now turned our attention to the whale, which had dived again.  As it
+was now loose, we did not know, of course, where it would come up, so we
+lay still awhile.  Very soon up he came, not far from us, and as fierce
+as ever.
+
+"Now, lads, we _must_ get that whale," cried the mate; "give way with a
+will."
+
+The order was obeyed.  The boat almost leaped over the swell, and,
+before long, another harpoon was in the whale's back.
+
+"Fast again, hurrah!" shouted the mate, "now for the lance."
+
+He gave the monster two deep stabs while he spoke, and spouting the red
+stream of life, it rolled on the sea in agony, obliging us to keep well
+out of its way.
+
+I could not look upon the dying struggles of this enormous fish without
+feelings of regret and self-reproach, for helping to destroy it.  I felt
+almost as if I were a murderer, and that the Creator would call me to
+account for taking part in the destruction of one of His grandest living
+creatures.  But the thought passed quickly from my mind as the whale
+became more violent and went into its flurry.  It began to lash the sea
+with such astonishing violence, that all the previous struggles seemed
+as nothing.  The water all round became white like milk, with great
+streaks of red blood running through it, and the sound of the quick
+blows of its tail and fins resembled that of dull hollow thunder.  We
+gazed at this scene in deep silence and with beating hearts.
+
+All at once the struggles ceased.  The great carcass rolled over belly
+up, and lay extended on the sea in death.  To me it seemed as if a dead
+calm had suddenly fallen around us, after a long and furious storm, so
+great was the change when that whale at length parted with its huge
+life.  The silence was suddenly broken by three hearty cheers, and then,
+fastening a rope to our prize, we commenced towing it to the ship, which
+operation occupied us the greater part of the night, for we had no fewer
+than eight miles to pull.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT.
+
+DEATH ON THE SEA.
+
+The whale which we had taken, as I have related in the last chapter, was
+our largest fish of that season.  It produced ninety barrels of oil, and
+was worth about 500 pounds sterling, so that we did not grieve much over
+the loss of our boat.
+
+But our next loss was of a kind that could not be made up for by oil or
+money, for it was the loss of a human life.  In the whale-fishery men
+must, like soldiers, expect to risk their lives frequently, and they
+have too often, alas! to mourn over the loss of a shipmate or friend.
+Up to this time our voyage had gone prosperously.  We had caught so many
+fish that nearly half our cargo was already completed, and if we should
+be as lucky the remainder of the voyage, we should be able to return
+home to Old England much sooner than we had expected.
+
+Of course, during all this time we had met with some disappointments,
+for I am not describing everything that happened on that voyage.  It
+would require a much thicker volume than this to tell the half of our
+adventures.  We lost five or six fish by their sinking before we could
+get them made fast to the ship, and one or two bolted so fast that they
+broke loose and carried away a number of harpoons, and many a fathom of
+line.  But such misfortunes were what we had to look for.  Every whaler
+meets with similar changes of luck, and we did not expect to fare
+differently from our neighbours.  These things did not cause us much
+regret beyond the time of their occurrence.  But it was far otherwise
+with the loss that now befell us.
+
+It happened one forenoon.  I was standing close to the starboard gangway
+early that morning, looking over the side into the calm water, for there
+was not a breath of wind, and talking to the first mate, who was a
+gruff, surly man, but a good officer, and kind enough in his way when
+everything went smooth with him.  But things don't go very smooth
+generally in whaling life, so the mate was oftener gruff than sweet.
+
+"Bob Ledbury," said he, "have you got your cutting-in gear in order?
+I've got a notion that we'll `raise the oil' this day."
+
+"All right, sir," said I, "you might shave yourself with the
+blubber-spades.  That was a good fish we got last, sir, wasn't it?"
+
+"Pretty good, though I've seen bigger."
+
+"He gave us a deal of trouble too," said I.
+
+"Not so much as I've seen others give," said he.  "When I was fishing in
+the Greenland Seas we made fast to a whale that cost us I don't know how
+many hundred dollars."  (You must know the first mate was a Yankee, and
+he reckoned everything in dollars.)
+
+"How was that, sir?" asked I.
+
+"Well, it was something in this fashion.  We were floating about in the
+North Atlantic one calm, hot day, just something like this, only it was
+the afternoon, not the morning.  We were doing nothing, and whistling
+for a breeze, when, all of a sudden, up comes five or six whales all
+round the ship, as if they had spied her from the bottom of the sea, and
+had come up to have a squint at her.  Of course the boats were manned at
+once, and in less than no time we were tearing after them like all
+alive.  But them whales were pretty wildish, I guess.  They kept us
+pullin' the best part of five hours before we got a chance at them.  My
+boat was out of sight of the ship before we made fast to a regular
+snorer, a hundred-barreller at the least.  The moment he felt the iron,
+away he went like the shot out of a gun; but he didn't keep it up long,
+for soon after, another of our boats came up and made fast.  Well, for
+some two or three hours we held fast, but could not haul on to him to
+use the lance, for the moment we came close up alongside of his tail he
+peaked flukes and dived, then up again, and away as fast as ever.  It
+was about noon before we touched him again; but by that time two more
+harpoons were made fast, and two other boats cast tow-lines aboard of
+us, and were hauled along.  That was four boats, and more than sixteen
+hundred fathoms of line, besides four harpoons that was fast to that
+whale, and yet, for all that, he went ahead as fast as we could have
+rowed, takin' us along with him quite easy.
+
+"A breeze having sprung up, our ship overhauled us in the course of the
+afternoon, and towards evening we sent a line on board, to see if that
+would stop the big fish, and the topsails were lowered, so as to throw
+some of the ship's weight on him, but the irons drew out with the
+strain.  However, we determined to try it again.  Another line was sent
+aboard about eight o'clock, and the topsails were lowered, but the line
+snapped immediately.  Well, we held on to that whale the whole of that
+night, and at four o'clock next morning, just thirty-six hours after he
+was first struck, two fast lines were taken aboard the ship.  The breeze
+was fresh, and against us, so the top-gallant sails were taken in, the
+courses hauled up, and the topsails clewed down, yet, I assure you, that
+whale towed the ship dead against the wind for an hour and a half at the
+rate of two miles an hour, and all the while beating the water with his
+fins and tail, so that the sea was in a continual foam.  We did not kill
+that fish till after forty hours of the hardest work I ever went
+through."
+
+Some of my shipmates seemed to doubt the truth of this story; but, for
+my part, I believed it, because the mate was a grave, truthful man,
+though he was gruff, and never told lies, as far as I knew.  Moreover, a
+case of the same kind happened some years afterwards, to a messmate of
+mine, while he was serving aboard the _Royal Bounty_, on the 28th of May
+1817.
+
+I know that some of the stories which I now tell must seem very wild and
+unlikely to landsmen; but those who have been to the whale-fishery will
+admit that I tell nothing but the truth, and if there are any of my
+readers who are still doubtful, I would say, go and read the works of
+Captain Scoresby.  It is well known that this whaling captain was a
+truly religious man, who gave up the fishing, though it turned him in
+plenty of money, and became a minister of the gospel with a small
+income, so it is not likely that he would have told what was untrue.
+Well, in his works we find stories that are quite as remarkable as the
+one I have just told, some of them more so.
+
+For instance, he tells us of one whale, in the Greenland Seas, which was
+not killed till it had drawn out ten thousand four hundred and forty
+yards, or about _six miles_ of line, fastened to fifteen harpoons,
+besides taking one of the boats entirely under water, which boat was
+never seen again.
+
+The mate told us two or three more stories, and a lot of us were
+gathered round him, listening eagerly, for there is nothing Jack likes
+so much as a _good yarn_, when all of a sudden, the man at the mast-head
+sang out that a large sperm whale was spouting away two points off the
+lee-bow.  Of course we were at our posts in a moment.
+
+"There she blows! there she breaches!" sung the look-out.
+
+"Lower away!" roared the captain.
+
+The boats were in the water, and the men on their seats in a moment.
+
+The whale we were after was a very large one; we could see that, for
+after two hours' hard pulling we got near enough to throw a harpoon, and
+after it was fixed he jumped clean out of the water.  Then there was the
+usual battle.  It was fierce and long; so long that I began to fear we
+would have to return empty handed to the ship.  We put ten harpoons into
+him, one after another, and had a stiff run between the fixing of each.
+
+It is astonishing the difference between the fish.  One will give you no
+trouble at all.  I have often seen a good big fellow killed in half an
+hour.  Another will take you half a day, and perhaps you may lose him
+after all.  The whale we were now after, at last took to showing fight.
+He made two or three runs at the boat, but the mate, who was in command,
+pricked him off with the lance cleverly.  At last we gave him a severe
+wound, and immediately he dived.
+
+"That was into his life," remarked Tom Lokins, as we sat waiting for him
+to come up again.  The captain's boat was close to ours, about ten yards
+off.  We had not to wait long.  The sudden stoppage and slacking off of
+all the lines showed that the whale was coming up.  All at once I saw a
+dark object rising directly under the captain's boat.  Before I could
+make out what it was, almost before I could think, the boat flew up into
+the air, as if a powder magazine had exploded beneath it.  The whale had
+come up, and hit it with his head right on the keel, so that it was
+knocked into pieces, and the men, oars, harpoons, lances, and tackle
+shot up in confusion into the air.
+
+Immediately after that the whale went into his flurry, but we paid no
+attention to him, in our anxiety to pick up our companions.  They all
+came to the surface quickly enough, but while some made for the boats
+vigorously, others swam slowly and with pain, showing that they were
+hurt, while one or two floated, as if dead, upon the water.
+
+Most of the men had escaped with only a few cuts and bruises, but one
+poor fellow was hauled out of the water with a leg broken, and another
+was so badly knocked about the head that it was a long time before he
+was again fit for duty.  The worst case, however, was that of poor Fred
+Borders.  He had a leg broken, and a severe wound in the side from a
+harpoon which had been forced into the flesh over the barbs, so that we
+could hardly get it drawn out.  We laid him in the stern of the boat,
+where he lay for some time insensible; but in a short time he revived,
+and spoke to us in a faint voice.  His first words were--"I'm dying,
+messmates."
+
+"Don't say that, Fred," said I, while my heart sank within me.  "Cheer
+up, my boy, you'll live to be the death of many a whale yet.  See, put
+your lips to this can--it will do you good."
+
+He shook his head gently, being too weak to reply.
+
+We had killed a big fish that day, and we knew that when he was "tried
+in" we should have completed our cargo; but there was no cheer given
+when the monster turned over on his side, and the pull to the ship that
+evening seemed to us the longest and heaviest we ever had, for our
+hearts were very sad.
+
+Next day Fred was worse, and we all saw that his words would come
+true,--he was dying.
+
+I was permitted to nurse my poor messmate, and I spent much of my time
+in reading the Bible to him, at his own request.
+
+He lived about a week after the accident and then he died.  We buried
+our shipmate in the usual sailor fashion.  We wrapped him in his
+hammock, with a cannon-ball at his feet to sink him.  The captain read
+the burial-service at the gangway, and then, in deep silence, we
+committed his corpse to the deep.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE.
+
+NEWS FROM HOME--A GAM.
+
+The death of poor Fred Borders cast a gloom over the ship for many days.
+Every one had respected, and many of us had loved the lad, so that we
+mourned for him long and truly.  But a sailor's life is such a rough
+one, requiring so much energy and hearty good-will to his work, that he
+cannot afford to allow the sorrows of his heart to sit long on his
+countenance.  In a day or two after no one would have supposed we had
+lost one of our best men.  Whales appeared in great numbers around us.
+The old cry of "There she blows!" ran out frequently from the mast-head,
+and the answering cry from the captain, "Where away?" was followed by
+the "Stand by to lower!--lower away."  Then came the chase, with all its
+dangers and excitement--the driving of the harpoon, the sudden rush of
+the struck fish, the smoke and sparks of fire from the logger-head, the
+plunging of the lance, the spouting blood, the "flurry" at the end, and
+the wild cheer as we beheld our prize floating calmly on the sea.  And
+in the midst of such work we forgot for a time the solemn scene we had
+so recently witnessed.  But our hearts were not so light as before, and
+although we did not show it, I knew full well that many a joke was
+checked, and many a laugh repressed, for the memory of our dead
+shipmate.
+
+The man who was most affected by his death was the captain; but we were
+not prepared for the great change that soon appeared in his manner and
+conduct.  After a time he laughed with the rest of us at a good joke,
+and cheered as loud as the best when a big fish turned belly up, but his
+behaviour to us became more gentle and kind, and he entirely gave up the
+habit of swearing.  He also forbade working on Sunday.  Many a whale
+have I seen sporting and spouting near us on that day, but never did we
+lower a boat or touch a harpoon on Sunday.  Some of the men grumbled at
+this, and complained of it to each other, but they never spoke so as to
+let the captain hear, and they soon gave up their grumbling, for the
+most of us were well pleased with the change, and all of us had agreed
+to it.
+
+The first Sunday after Fred's death, the captain assembled the crew on
+the quarter-deck, and spoke to us about it.
+
+"My lads," said he, "I've called you aft to make a proposal that may
+perhaps surprise some of you.  Up to this time, you know very well,
+there has been little difference aboard this ship between Saturday and
+Sunday.  Since our poor shipmate died I have been thinkin' much on this
+matter, and I've come to the conclusion that we shall rest from all work
+on Sunday, except such as must be done to work the ship.  Now, lads, you
+know me well enough by this time.  I have never been a religious man all
+my life, and I don't pretend to say that I'm one now.  I'm not very
+learned on this matter, and can't explain myself very well; but what
+think you, lads, shall we give the whales a rest on Sundays?"
+
+We all agreed to this at once, for the effect of the captain's speech
+was great upon us.  It was not so much what he said, as the way in which
+he said it.  He was by nature a bold, determined man, who never flinched
+from danger or duty, and when we heard him talking in that way we could
+scarcely believe our ears.
+
+This was all that was said about the matter between us and the captain,
+but we had many a hot discussion in the forecastle amongst ourselves
+after that.  Some were in favour of the new move, and said, stoutly,
+that the captain was a sensible fellow.  Others said he was becoming an
+old wife, and that no luck would follow the ship.  In the course of
+time, however, we found the benefit of the change in every way; and the
+grumblers were silenced, because in spite of their wise shakings of the
+head, we filled the ship with oil as full as she could hold, much sooner
+than we had expected.
+
+Shoregoing people have but little notion of the ease with which the
+heart of a jack-tar is made to rejoice when he is out on a long voyage.
+His pleasures and amusements are so few that he is thankful to make the
+most of whatever is thrown in his way.  In the whale-fisheries, no
+doubt, he has more than enough of excitement, but after a time he gets
+used to this, and begins to long for a little variety--and of all the
+pleasures that fall to his lot, that which delights him most is to have
+a gam with another ship.
+
+Now, a gam is the meeting of two or more whale-ships, their keeping
+company for a time, and the exchanging of visits by the crews.  It is
+neither more nor less than a jollification on the sea,--the inviting of
+your friends to feast and make merry in your floating house.  There is
+this difference, however, between a gam at sea and a party on land, that
+your _friends_ on the ocean are men whom you perhaps never saw before,
+and whom you will likely never meet again.  There is also another
+difference--there are no ladies at a gam.  This is a great want, for man
+is but a rugged creature when away from the refining influence of woman;
+but, in the circumstances, of course, it can't be helped.
+
+We had a gam one day, on this voyage, with a Yankee whale-ship, and a
+first-rate gam it was, for, as the Yankee had gammed three days before
+with another English ship, we got a lot of news second-hand; and, as we
+had not seen a new face for many months, we felt towards those Yankees
+like brothers, and swallowed all they had to tell us like men starving
+for news.
+
+It was on a fine calm morning, just after breakfast, that we fell in
+with this ship.  We had seen no whales for a day or two, but we did not
+mind that, for our hold was almost full of oil-barrels.  Tom Lokins and
+I were leaning over the starboard bulwarks, watching the small fish that
+every now and then darted through the clear-blue water like arrows, and
+smoking our pipes in silence.  Tom looked uncommonly grave, and I knew
+that he was having some deep and knowing thoughts of his own, which
+would leak out in time.  All at once he took his pipe from his mouth and
+stared earnestly at the horizon.
+
+"Bob," said he, speaking very slowly, "if there ain't a ship right off
+the starboard beam, I'm a Dutchman."
+
+"You don't mean it!" said I, starting with a feeling of excitement.
+
+Before another word could be uttered, the cry of "Sail ho!" came ringing
+down from the mast-head.  Instantly the quiet of the morning was broken;
+sleepers sprang up and rubbed their eyes, the men below rushed wildly up
+the hatchway, the cook came tearing out of his own private den,
+flourishing a soup-ladle in one hand and his tormentors in the other,
+the steward came tumbling up with a lump of dough in his fist that he
+had forgot to throw down in his haste, and the captain bolted up from
+the cabin without his hat.
+
+"Where away?" cried he, with more than his usual energy.
+
+"Right off the starboard beam, sir."
+
+"Square the yards!  Look alive, my hearties," was the next order; for
+although the calm sea was like a sheet of glass, a light air, just
+sufficient to fill our top-gallant sails, enabled us to creep through
+the water.
+
+"Hurrah!" shouted the men as we sprang to obey.
+
+"What does she look like?" roared the captain.
+
+"A big ship, sir, I think," replied the look-out, "but I can only just
+make out the top of her main t-gallan' s'l."--(Sailors scorn to speak of
+_top-gallant sails_).
+
+Gradually, one by one, the white sails of the stranger rose up like
+cloudlets out of the sea, and our hearts beat high with hope and
+expectation as we beheld the towering canvas of a full-rigged ship rise
+slowly into view.
+
+"Show our colours," said the captain.
+
+In a moment the Union Jack of Old England was waving at the mast-head in
+the gentle breeze, and we watched anxiously for a reply.  The stranger
+was polite; his colours flew up a moment after, and displayed the
+Stripes and Stars of America.
+
+"A Yankee!" exclaimed some of the men in a tone of slight
+disappointment.
+
+I may remark, that our disappointment arose simply from the fact that
+there was no chance, as we supposed, of getting news from "home" out of
+a ship that must have sailed last from America.  For the rest, we cared
+not whether they were Yankees or Britons--they were men who could speak
+the English tongue, that was enough for us.
+
+"Never mind, boys," cried one, "we'll have a jolly gam; that's a fact."
+
+"So we will," said another, "and I'll get news of my mad Irish cousin,
+Terrence O'Flannagan, who went out to seek his fortin in Ameriky with
+two shillin's and a broken knife in his pocket, and it's been said he's
+got into a government situation o' some sort connected with the jails,--
+whether as captain, or leftenant o' police, or turnkey, I'm not rightly
+sure."
+
+"More likely as a life-tenant of one of the cells," observed Bill Blunt,
+laughing.
+
+"Don't speak ill of a better man than yerself behind his back," retorted
+the owner of the Irish cousin.
+
+"Stand by to lower the jolly-boat," cried the captain.
+
+"Ay, ay, sir."
+
+"Lower away!"
+
+In a few minutes we were leaping over the calm sea in the direction of
+the strange ship, for the breeze had died down, and we were too eager to
+meet with new faces, and to hear the sound of new voices, to wait for
+the wind.
+
+To our joy we found that the Yankee had had a gam (as I have already
+said) with an English ship a few days before, so we returned to our
+vessel loaded with old newspapers from England, having invited the
+captain and crew of the Yankee to come aboard of us and spend the day.
+
+While preparation was being made for the reception of our friends, we
+got hold of two of the old newspapers, and Tom Lokins seized one, while
+Bill Blunt got the other, and both men sat down on the windlass to
+retail the news to a crowd of eager men who tried hard to listen to both
+at once, and so could make nothing out of either.
+
+"Hold hard, Tom Lokins," cried one.  "What's that you say about the
+Emperor, Bill?"
+
+"The Emperor of Roosia," said Bill Blunt, reading slowly, and with
+difficulty, "is--stop a bit, messmates, wot _can_ this word be?--the
+Emperor of Roosia is--"
+
+"Blowed up with gunpowder, and shattered to a thousand pieces," said Tom
+Lokins, raising his voice with excitement, as he read from _his_ paper
+an account of the blowing up of a mountain fortress in India.
+
+"Oh! come, I say, one at a time, if you please," cried a harpooner; "a
+feller can't git a word of sense out of sich a jumble."
+
+"Come, messmates," cried two or three voices, as Tom stopped suddenly,
+and looked hard at the paper, "go ahead! wot have ye got there that
+makes ye look as wise as an owl?  Has war been and broke out with the
+French?"
+
+"I do believe he's readin' the births, marriages, and deaths," said one
+of the men, peeping over Tom's shoulder.
+
+"Read 'em out, then, can't ye?" cried another.
+
+"I say, Bill Blunt, I think this consarns _you_," cried Tom: "isn't your
+sweetheart's name Susan Croft?"
+
+"That's a fact," said Bill, looking up from his paper, "and who has got
+a word to say agin the prettiest lass in all Liverpool?"
+
+"Nobody's got a word to say against her," replied Tom; "but she's
+married, that's all."
+
+Bill Blunt leaped up as if he had been shot, and the blood rushed to his
+face, as he seized the paper, and tried to find the place.
+
+"Where is it, Tom? let me see it with my own two eyes.  Oh, here it is!"
+
+The poor man's face grew paler and paler as he read the following
+words:--
+
+"Married at Liverpool, on the 5th inst, by the Reverend Charles Manson,
+Edward Gordon, Esquire, to Susan, youngest daughter of Admiral Croft--"
+
+A perfect roar of laughter drowned the remainder of the sentence.
+
+"Well done, Bill Blunt--Mister Blunt, we'll have to call him hereafter,"
+said Tom, with a grim smile; "I had no notion you thought so much o'
+yourself as to aim at an admiral's daughter."
+
+"All right, my hearties, chaff away!" said Bill, fetching a deep sigh of
+relief, while a broad grin played on his weather-beaten visage.
+"There's _two_ Susan Crofts, that's all; but I wouldn't give _my_ Susan
+for all the Admirals' daughters that ever walked in shoe-leather."
+
+"Hallo! here come the Yankees," cried the captain, coming on deck at
+that moment.
+
+Our newspapers were thrown down at once, and we prepared to receive our
+guests, who, we could see, had just put off from their ship in two
+boats.  But before they had come within a mile of us, their attention,
+as well as ours, was riveted on a most extraordinary sight.
+
+Not more than a hundred yards ahead of our ship, a whale came suddenly
+to the surface of the water, seeming, by its wild motions, to be in a
+state of terror.  It continued for some time to struggle, and lash the
+whole sea around it into a white foam.
+
+At once the boats were lowered from both ships, and we went after this
+fish, but his motions were so violent, that we found it utterly
+impossible to get near enough to throw a harpoon.  When we had
+approached somewhat closely, we discovered that it had been attacked by
+a killer fish, which was fully twenty feet long, and stuck to it like a
+leech.  The monster's struggles were made in trying to shake itself free
+of this tremendous enemy, but it could not accomplish this.  The killer
+held him by the under jaw, and hung on there, while the whale threw
+himself out of the water in his agony, with his great mouth open like a
+huge cavern, and the blood flowing so fast from the wound that the sea
+was dyed for a long distance round.  The killer fought like a bulldog.
+It held on until the whale was exhausted, but they passed away from us
+in such a confused struggle, that a harpoon could not be fixed for an
+hour after we first saw them.  On this being done, the killer let go,
+and the whale, being already half dead, was soon killed.
+
+The Yankee boats were the first to come up with this fish, so the prize
+belonged to them.  We were well pleased at this, as we could afford to
+let them have it, seeing that we could scarcely have found room to stow
+away the oil in our hold.  It was the Yankees' first fish, too, so they
+were in great spirits about it, and towed it to their ship, singing
+"Yankee-doodle" with all their might.
+
+As they passed our boat the captain hailed them.
+
+"I wish you joy of your first fish, sir," said he to the Yankee captain.
+
+"Thank you, stranger.  I guess we're in luck, though it ain't a big one.
+I say, what sort o' brute was that, that had hold of him?  Never seed
+sich a crittur in all my life."
+
+"He's a killer," said our captain.
+
+"A killer!  Guess he just is, and no mistake: if we hadn't helped him,
+he'd have done the job for himself!  What does he kill him for?"
+
+"To eat him, but I'm told he only eats the tongue.  You'll not forget
+that you've promised to gam with us to-night," cried our captain, as
+they were about to commence pulling again.
+
+"All right, stranger, one half will come to-night, before sundown;
+t'other half to-morrow, if the calm holds.  Good-day.  Give way, lads."
+
+The men dipped their oars, and resumed their song, while we pulled back
+to our ship.  We did not offer to help them, because the fish was a
+small one, and the distance they had to go not great.
+
+It was near sunset when, according to promise, the Yankees came on
+board, and spent a long evening with us.  They were a free,
+open-hearted, boastful, conceited, good-humoured set of fellows, and a
+jolly night we had of it in the forecastle, while the mates and captains
+were enjoying themselves and spinning their yarns in the cabin.
+
+Of course, we began with demands for home news, and, when we had pumped
+out of them every drop they had, we began to sing songs and to spin
+yarns.  And it was now that my friend Tom Lokins came out strong, and
+went on at such a rate, that he quite won the hearts of our guests.  Tom
+was not noisy, and he was slow in his talk, but he had the knack of
+telling a good story; he never used a wrong word, or a word too many,
+and, having a great deal of humour, men could not help listening when he
+began to talk.
+
+After this we had a dance, and here I became useful, being able to play
+Scotch reels and Irish jigs on the fiddle.  Then we had songs and yarns
+again.  Some could tell of furious fights with whales that made our
+blood boil; others could talk of the green fields at home, until we
+almost fancied we were boys again; and some could not tell stories at
+all.  They had little to say, and that little they said ill; and I
+noticed that many of those who were perfect bores would cry loudest to
+be heard, though none of us wanted to hear them.  We used to quench such
+fellows by calling loudly for a song with a rousing chorus.
+
+It was not till the night was far spent, and the silver moon was sailing
+through the starry sky, that the Yankees left us, and rowed away with a
+parting cheer.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN.
+
+RETURN HOME.
+
+Six months after our "gam" with the Yankees Tom Lokins and I found
+ourselves seated once more in the little garret beside my dear old
+mother.
+
+"Deary me, Robert, how changed ye are!"
+
+"Changed, mother!  I should think so!  If you'd gone through all that
+I've done and seen since we last sat together in this room you'd be
+changed too."
+
+"And have ye really seen the whales, my boy?" continued my mother,
+stroking my face with her old hand.
+
+"Seen them? ay, and killed them too--many of them."
+
+"You've been in danger, my son," said my mother earnestly, "but God has
+preserved you safe through it all."
+
+"Ay, mother, He has preserved my life in the midst of many dangers,"
+said I, "for which I am most thankful."
+
+There was a short silence after this, during which my mother and I gazed
+earnestly at each other, and Tom Lokins smoked his pipe and stared at
+the fire.
+
+"Robert, how big is a whale?" inquired my mother suddenly.
+
+"How big? why, it's as big as a small ship, only it's longer, and not
+quite so fat."
+
+"Robert," replied my mother gravely, "ye didn't used to tell untruths;
+ye must be jokin'."
+
+"Joking, mother, I was never more in earnest in my life.  Why, I tell
+you that I've seen, ay, and helped to cut up, whales that were more than
+sixty feet long, with heads so big that their mouths could have taken in
+a boat.  Why, mother, I declare to you that you could put this room into
+a whale's mouth, and you and Tom and I could sit round this table and
+take our tea upon his tongue quite comfortable.  Isn't that true, Tom?"
+
+My mother looked at Tom, who removed his pipe, puffed a cloud of smoke,
+and nodded his head twice very decidedly.
+
+"Moreover," said I, "a whale is so big and strong, that it can knock a
+boat right up into the air, and break in the sides of a ship.  One day a
+whale fell right on top of one of our boats, and smashed it all to bits.
+Now that's a real truth!"
+
+Again my mother looked at Tom Lokins, and again that worthy man puffed
+an immense cloud of smoke, and nodded his head more decidedly than
+before.  Being anxious to put to flight all her doubts at once, he said
+solemnly, "Old ooman, that's a fact!"
+
+"Robert," said my mother, "tell me something about the whales."
+
+Just as she said this the door opened, and in came the good old
+gentleman with the nose like his cane-knob, and with as kind a heart as
+ever beat in a human breast.  My mother had already told me that he came
+to see her regularly once a week, ever since I went to sea, except in
+summer, when he was away in the country, and that he had never allowed
+her to want for anything.
+
+I need scarcely say that there was a hearty meeting between us three,
+and that we had much to say to each other.  But in the midst of it all
+my mother turned to the old gentleman and said--
+
+"Robert was just going to tell me something about his adventures with
+the whales."
+
+"That's capital!" cried the old gentleman, rubbing his hands.  "Come,
+Bob, my boy, let's hear about 'em."
+
+Being thus invited, I consented to spin them a yarn.  The old gentleman
+settled himself in his chair, my mother smoothed her apron, folded her
+hands, and looked meekly into my face.  Tom Lokins filled his pipe,
+stretched out his foot to poke the fire with the toe of his shoe, and
+began to smoke like a steam-engine; then I cleared my throat and began
+my tale, and before I had done talking that night, I had told them all
+that I have told in this little book, almost word for word.
+
+Thus ended my first voyage to the South Seas.  Many and many a trip have
+I made since then, and many a wonderful sight have I seen, both in the
+south and in the north.  But if I were to write an account of all my
+adventures, my little book would grow into a big one; I must therefore
+come to a close.
+
+The profits of this voyage were so great, that I was enabled to place my
+mother in a position of comfort for the rest of her life, which, alas!
+was very short.  She died about six months after my return.  I nursed
+her to the end, and, when I laid her dear head in the grave, my heart
+seemed to die within me, for I felt that I had lost one of God's most
+precious gifts--an honest, gentle, pious mother.
+
+I'm getting to be a old man now, but I am comfortable and happy, and as
+I have more than enough of this world's goods, and no family to care
+for, my chief occupation is to look after the poor, and particularly the
+old women who live in my neighbourhood.  After the work of the day is
+done, I generally go and spend the evening with Tom Lokins, who lives
+near by, and is stout and hearty still; or he comes and spends it with
+me, and, while we smoke our pipes together, we often fall to talking
+about those stirring days when, in the strength and hope of youth, we
+sailed together to the South Seas, and took to--_Fighting the Whales_.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Fighting the Whales, by R.M. Ballantyne
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