PERILS OF POLAR WHALING 



peaked our oars and had faced forward to grab the line 

 and check him. That line went out quicker than a wink. 

 It was buz-z-z-z-z around the logger head which was smok- 

 ing like a tar pot on fire, and before we could realize what 

 had happened, the four tubs of whale line, 600 fathoms, or 

 3600 feet, had disappeared forever. The " old man " stood 

 paralyzed at the outgo, and at last, recovering himself, 

 said: " Damn the whale, go ahead." I have often won- 

 dered if Farragut did not hear of that saying and sub- 

 stitute the word " torpedo " for whale in his memorable 

 utterance at Mobile Bay. The old man grieved over the 

 loss of that whale line, and out of spite one day, we lowered 

 a boat and stole a calf whale from its mother's side, killed 

 and hoisted it bodily on board ship. We tried it out, the 

 net products being five barrels of sulphur bottom whale 

 oil, which we burned in our lamps, and a nice mess of whale 

 meat. 



That ended our whaling in the Antarctic, but not our 

 miseries. For nearly four months we battled with storm, 

 field-floe and berg ice, having many narrow escapes, and 

 when we finally emerged from the frigidity, mingled with 

 the fogs, which caused much suffering, it was unanimously 

 resolved that we never would spend another summer in the 

 Antarctic Ocean. 



We had spent a summer in the Antarctic, and were full 

 of yarns to spin to our fleet-mates whom we had met on 

 our passage north, over the sperm whale grounds of the 

 Pacific Ocean and among the groups of islands which dot 

 its chart, little dreaming that we were actually pointing 

 our prow for the Arctic Ocean; but it was to come to pass. 

 We fell in with a ship one day, the crew of which brought 

 us the news of the discovery of the celebrated bowhead 

 whale of the 40's. No sooner had we learned the details 

 than we spread sail to reach the Bering Sea gates to the 

 North Pole, and enter the domains of the new whale, said 

 to " stow down " anywhere from three hundred to five hun- 

 dred barrels. Night and day we carried sail like an India- 

 man, to reach the goal, and, with a speedy ship, we turned 

 up at the Fox Islands in May. 



As soon as the ice permitted, we entered the precincts 

 where we were to realize our hopes for a " full ship " of oil 



363 



