30 THE WHALE AND 



Whaling Literature. Whaling Life. 



of J. R. Browne, called " Etchings of a Whal- 

 ing Cruise," and in a volume entitled " Inci- 

 dents of a Whaling Voyage, by F. A. Olmsted." 

 Without superseding or conflicting with ei- 

 ther of those entertaining books, the course pur- 

 sued in the present volume is an independent 

 one, whereby it is aimed to finish the comple- 

 ment of whaling literature, and supply what 

 was wanting, in order to put the reading pub- 

 lic in possession of a full-length portraiture of 

 the whaleman as seen in the actual pursuit and 

 garb of his perilous occupation. Personal nar- 

 rative and incident, other than what bears di- 

 rectly upon this, are therefore omitted, together 

 with those minute descriptions of whaling im- 

 plements, outfits, modes, customs, and sea- 

 usages to be found elsewhere. Neither does it 

 enter into our purpose to portray a sailor's life 

 and manners in the forecastle or before the 

 mast, alow or aloft, for this is a department of 

 marine literature in which books are so numer- 

 ous, both in the form of the novel and the sea 

 journal, that little remains to be told. In ad- 

 ventures, however, almost every whaleman's 

 voyage is an original, certainly so to himself. 

 We begin, therefore, at once, with the peculiar 



