APPALLING DANGERS. 187 



that would beat in the oak ribs of a stout ship 

 would hardly, I suppose, give a bull whale the 

 headache. There are two cases I have heard 

 of, one in the Atlantic and one in the Pacific, 

 in which an enormous sperm whale, with malice 

 aforethought, did thus run three several times 

 full tilt against a whale-ship, until his butting 

 had battered in her sides, and the men had to 

 abandon the ships a thousand miles from land. 

 But three or four survived the peril in each 

 case, and got safe to land. One of them, then 

 a boy, is now master of a whale- ship, still 

 grappling with dangers, and successfully prose- 

 cuting this adventurous trade. 



I have known of one captain who was killed 

 instantly in the bow of his boat, by the tap of 

 a whale's fin upon his skull, when no one else 

 was at all injured. To have legs and arms 

 broken, or ribs knocked in, to be drawn over- 

 board and under water by entanglements of the 

 line, or to have a whole boat's crew scrambling 

 together in the water, is, as we have already 

 seen, very common. 



Captain Scoresby, in his voyage of research 



