THE AMERICAN WHALEMAN. 297 



sense of the sailor on his return from the open sea the per- 

 fume exhaled from the mosses and ferns, the grasses, the 

 flowering shrubs, and the shading forests. It strikes the 

 senses of the hungry children of the sea, as the fragrance 

 of the mother's milk strikes the little baby. The rugged, 

 storm-beaten man, with softened feelings, welcomes the fa- 

 miliar influences under which he was born; but the thrice 

 welcome airs of the distant continent, grateful as they are, 

 yet make him faint and sick with thoughts of home and 

 kindred. 



The odor guides us to our haven, as the scent of the wa- 

 ter attracts the camel in the desert. But other senses than 

 that of smell are cognizant of the far-reaching influence; 

 for to the scurvy-stricken mariner it comes as the curse of 

 Prospero : 



" I'll rack thee with old cramps ; . 



Fill all thy bones with aches ; make thee roar, 



That beasts shall tremble at thy din." 



A crisis in this disease being induced by this mysterious 

 land essence, is soon followed by recovery or death. 



To the question from the deck, " Where away lies the 

 land ?" " Dead ahead" is the answer. 



Again let the sailor, question you you who lose your way 

 on fenced roads, and rush along iron tracks which clamp 

 you in the -path you should go. Let me ask, can you re- 

 alize the full significance of the answer " Dead ahead," after 

 months of drifting on trackless seas ? Of course the sought 

 land will be " dead ahead " on the course of the frigate-bird, 

 for it is piloted by that God-given-compass guide, an uner- 

 ring instinct ; but how happens it that yonder speck of land 

 is dead ahead to the weather-stained waif of the sea whose 

 wanderings you have followed in these pages ? Our white- 

 winged lady sails, endowed with the wonderful inventions 

 of men's minds. With the magnetized finger of steel to 



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