A BOY WHO WENT WHALING 211 



machine broke; but with knives they continued the mincing, 

 slicing the blubber into thin leaves, like bacon cut and left on 

 the rind, and the boiling went on apace. 



As they boiled, the thick black smoke permeated every gar- 

 ment and compartment, and the fetid smell crept into forecastle 

 and cabin. The fires flamed up, and the men, stripped to the 

 waist, leaped like devils in attendance on the bubbling try- 

 pots. Smith, carpenter, and cooper worked at anvil and bench; 

 the grindstone whined incessantly against steel spades and 

 knives and the blunted edges of used irons. So rugged was the 

 weather, when the Lancer was boiling her first whale, that the 

 rolling deck ran with oil and water. 



Then they cooled the oil and coopered it and stowed it down, 

 cleaned away the grease, holystoned the deck, and cruised 

 along south toward the Azores, whaling as they went. 



In their idle hours, which were many when no whales were 

 seen, they made jagging wheels and ivory combs and model 

 vessels; and on the polished teeth of sperm whales they engraved 

 with marvellous skill pictures of whaling vessels and men-of-war 

 and island women. 



As the men worked, the yellow-haired boy watched them and 

 listened to their yams, or tinkered at a whale's tooth. Strange 

 stories were told, and many of them were true. Adventure has 

 little more to offer those who have struck a forty-barrel bull 

 and have ridden tempestuous leagues at the end of a taut line, 

 with smoke streaming from the loggerhead, until a lance struck 

 to the "life," and clotted blood showered the boats and stained 

 the sea. 



He sat ready by his oar when they swept down, under 

 sail, on feeding pods. He did a man's work when, in calm 

 weather, with paddles, lest the sound of oars startle the wary 

 creatures, they sneaked up on solitary whales, and with keel 

 to black skin, struck the irons to the hitches, then towed 

 their catch back to the becalmed ship, and cut it in while 

 the sharks bit out great chunks of blubber, stealing a quart 

 of oil at every bite, and the vessel heeled under the strain of 

 the great tackles, and the decks were as slippery as the places 



