ON THE "LINE" O BOUNDS. 221 



of them now, though, for whatever was on my line was 

 coming up hand-over-fist. 



With a bound it reached the surface — the identical 

 cow so long attendant upon the dead whale. Having 

 been so long below for such a small whale, she was quite 

 exhausted, and before she had recovered we had got 

 alongside of her and lanced her, so thoroughly that she 

 died without a struggle. The ship was so close that we 

 had her alongside in a wonderfully short time, and with 

 scarcely any trouble. 



When I reached the deck, the skipper called me, and 

 said several things that made feel about six inches taller. 

 He was, as may be thought, exceedingly pleased, saying 

 that only once in his long career had he seen a similar 

 case ; for I forgot to mention that the line was en- 

 tangled around the cow's down-hanging jaw, as if she 

 had actually tried to bite in two the rope that held her 

 consort, and only succeeded in sharing his.fate. I would 

 not like to say that whales do not try to thus sever a 

 line, but, their teeth being several inches apart, conical, 

 and fitting into sockets in the upper jaw instead of 

 meeting the opposed surfaces of other teeth, the accom- 

 plishment of such a feat must, I think, be impossible. 



The ship being now as good as anchored by the vast 



mass of flesh hanging to her, there was a tremendous 



task awaiting us to get the other fish alongside. Of 



course they were all to windward ; they nearly always 



are, unless the ship is persistently " turned to windward " 



while the fishing is going on. Whalers believe that they 



always work up into the wind while fast, and, when dead, 



it is certain that they drift at a pretty good rate right in 



the "wind's eye." This is accounted for by the play of 



the body, which naturally lies head to wind ; and the 

 16 



