Sketches Afloat with the Whalers 249 



"Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood, 



Stand dressed in living green, 

 So to the Jews old Canaan stood, 

 While Jordan rolled between." 



The first work on every whaler, after reaching 

 open water, was the training of the raw hands. 

 Some whaler captains allowed them to rest in the 

 forecastle until the inevitable seasickness had 

 worn off, but as a rule they had to work it off. 

 Bullen says of his first evening on a whaler : 



"Seven stalwart men were being compelled to 

 march up and down on that tumbling deck, 

 men who had never before trodden anything less 

 solid than the earth. The third mate, a waspish, 

 spiteful little Yankee, with a face like an angry 

 cat, strolled about among them, a strand of rope 

 yarns in his hand, which he wielded constantly, 

 regardless of where he struck a man. They fell 

 about, sometimes four at once, and his blows 

 flew thick and fast, yet he never seemed to weary 

 of his ill doing. . . . Such brutality I never 

 witnessed before." The next day, however, "in 

 spite of their treatment, perhaps because of it y 

 some of the poor fellows were beginning to take 

 hold of things man fashion." 



