444 WHALE FISHERY. 



in killing the whale. But the situation I now mean to 

 refer to, is, when the ice is crowded and nearly close ; 

 so close, indeed, that it scarcely affords room for boats to 

 pass through it, and by no means sufficient space for a 

 ship to be navigated among it. This kind of situation 

 occurs in somewhat open packs, or in large patches of 

 crowded ice, and affords a fair probability of capturing a 

 whale, though it is seldom accomplished without a con- 

 siderable degree of trouble. When the ice is very 

 crowded, and the ship cannot sail into it with propriety, 

 it is usual to seek out for a mooring to some large mass 

 of ice, if such can be found, extending two or three 

 fathoms or more under water.. 



A piece of ice of this kind, is capable not only of 

 holding the ship ' head-to-wind,' but also to windward of 

 the smaller ice. The boats then set out in chase of any 

 fish which may be seen ; and when one happens to be 

 struck, they proceed in the capture in a similar manner 

 as when in more favorable circumstances, excepting so 

 far as the obstruction which the quality and arrangement 

 of the ice may offer, to the regular system of proceeding. 

 Among crowded ice, for instance, the precise direction 

 pursued by the fish is not easily ascertained, nor can the 

 fish itself be readily discovered on its first arrival at the 

 surface, after being struck, on account of the elevation 

 of the intervening masses of ice, and the great quantity 

 of line it frequently takes from the fast-boat. Success 

 in such a situation, depends on the boats being spread 

 widely abroad, and on a judicious arrangement of each 

 boat, or a keen look out on the part of the harpooners in 

 the boat, and on their occasionally taking the benefit of 

 a hummack of ice, from the elevation of which the fish 

 may sometimes be seen ' blowing ' in the interstices of the 

 ice ; or pushing or rowing the boats with the greatest 

 imaginable celerity, towards the place where the fish may 

 have been seen ; and, lastly, on the exercise of the high- 

 est degree of activity and despatch in every proceeding. 



If these means be neglected, the fish will generally 

 have taken his breath, renewed his strength, and remov- 

 ed to some other quarter, before the arrival of the boats ; 

 and it is often remarked, that if there be one part of the 



