34 WHALING 



another and **one fast to another like a team of horses," towed 

 it to the ship. 



Of the flensing, or "cutting in" as it is now colloquially called, 

 various descriptions have come down to us. They would let the 

 beast lie for twenty-four hours, then take out the whalebone, or 

 "finns," and the tongue, and cut off the blubber in big pieces, 

 turning the body with slings and tackle while they worked. 



It was customary to tow the blubber ashore, where the 

 "waterside-man," standing mid-leg deep in water, removed 

 whatever unclean flesh clung to it and cut it into pieces of some 

 two hundred pounds each. These pieces two men with a barrow 

 would carry to a stage beside the works, and there the "stage- 

 cutter" with a long knife sliced them into pieces half an inch thick 

 and a foot or so long, which he threw into the "slicing-cooler." 

 Beyond the slicing-cooler were stationed five or six "choppers," 

 who laid the sliced blubber on blocks cut from the whale's tail 

 (because the tail was so tough), and chopped it into bits an inch 

 or two long and a quarter of an inch thick. These they threw 

 into the "chopping-cooler," which held two or three tuns. 



The try-works, which stood beyond the chopping-cooler, are 

 not easily visualized from the old descriptions alone. The 

 terms are confusing and many phrases are ambiguous. But 

 with the help of old engravings to illustrate the whalemen's 

 descriptions, we can get a clear idea of how they looked and 

 of how they were arranged. In a platform set upon a wall of 

 masonry were from one to three "copper-holes" in a row, into 

 which were set with mortar the coppers, or kettles for boiling 

 out the oil, each of which held about a hundred gallons. At 

 one side was the stoke hole, through which the whalemen fed 

 the fires under the coppers, and from which a chimney built 

 on an arch drew off the smoke and flame. 



From the chopping coolers, the "tub-fillers" with copper ladles 

 on six-foot handles would bale the chopped blubber into hogs- 

 heads, which they would draw from the cooler to the try- 

 works and empty into the coppers. They began the boiling 

 with a wood fire. At the proper moment, the "coppermen," 

 working with long-handled copper ladles, bailed the oil and the 



