188 THB WHALE AND 



Fin out. Prize measured. Yield of Oil. 



whole length broadside toward us. We had 

 nothing to do but to pull up and in lance, the 

 whale laying perfectly still all the time. In 

 twenty minutes she went into her flurry, and 

 soon after lay fin out. We took her alongside 

 the ship, and commenced cutting her in ; but 

 it took all the next day to get her all in. She 

 measured over seventy-five feet in length, and 

 between fifty and sixty feet round the largest 

 part of the body ; her jaw was seventeen and 

 a half feet long, and her flukes seventeen feet 

 broad. She stowed us down one hundred and 

 twenty-five barrels of sperm oil. 



In the vicissitudes of whaling fortune, a prize 

 like this now and then offers itself to a ship, in 

 the form of a dead whale afloat. Such a for- 

 tunate wind-fall once came to the Cremona, of 

 New Bedford, in 1839, while cruising on the 

 coast of Peru, in the latitude, of three degrees 

 south. Her master there fell in with two whal- 

 ing ships belonging to the same port Being 

 old acquaintances, they were happy to see each 

 other compared notes talked of old times; 

 and whales being in sight all around, although 

 rather shy, they agreed to keep company for 

 the night, hoping for good luck on the morrow. 



