1902 Some Deep-Sea Plunder 317 



For some time they played in docile fashion round the ship, 

 and then rolled off in search of fresh seas and waters new. 

 A crew of Icelanders was setting sail for home alongside at 

 the time, and it was curious to note the utter disregard with 

 which they greeted the black leviathans as they rose to the 

 surface, so close to the frail craft that any one of the crew 

 could almost have touched the shiny backs with his hand. 

 Familiarity indeed breeds contempt : for my part, small 

 specimens of their kind though they were, they set me think- 

 ing. Whales, however, are not uncommon in Faxe Bay. 

 The skipper told me he once saw a large one there, which 

 had lost its way. Having strayed in through a chance deep- 

 water entrance, it was unable to find a similar exit, being 

 met, presumably, by sandbanks or other causes of com- 

 paratively shallow water, from the attempted passage of 

 which the bulky frame shrank. 



A week elapsed in Faxe Bay. The skipper was itching to 

 be gone, and would long ago have signalled full speed ahead 

 for home, but for the continued scarcity of cod. At length 

 his heart's desire was granted. Suddenly, without warning, 

 the waters were filled with cod. Bag after bag, in towings 

 of twenty minutes and less, were hauled in, so full that the 

 load had to be lightened alongside before it could safely be 

 hoisted aboard. In a very short space of time the decks 

 were choked fore and aft with the greenish fish, cod and cod- 

 ling, big and small, veterans and babes, till the deck-hands 

 were wielding their gory knives waist-high in the slippery 

 mass. In less than two hours I computed that something 

 like 4000 fish must have been captured by the net. 



With a smile on his face the skipper laid a hand on the 

 telegraph, and the answering spurt of the screw churned the 

 water in our wake to foam. 



