CHAPTER THIRTEEN 



The Yankee Whaler 



IN THE YEAR 1 848 a sailor, perched in the crowsnest of a 

 smart British merchant packet homeward bound through 

 the Southern Trade Wind belt, sighted a vessel lifting over 

 the northern horizon. 



*Sail ho!' he called to his shipmates on the deck below, 

 and clapped his telescope to his eye. 



As the distance shortened he recognised the un- 

 mistakable features of a whaler ; first, the dark specks at 

 the three mastheads which he knew were the lookouts; 

 then the tall white cranes or davits that carried the four 

 whaleboats ; and as she loomed larger in the circle of the 

 telescope's vision, the odd-looking hump between the 

 foremast and the mainmast which he knew to be the try- 

 works that all whalers carried on their upper decks. 



'She's a blubber-hunter!' he called out to those 

 below. 



'They don't build 'em singly in America, they just saws 

 'em off in lengths,' quipped the bosun loudly and the men 

 laughed as they watched the sturdy squat-hulled vessel of 

 about three hundred and fifty tons hove into view. She 

 was one of over seven hundred whalers to sail from the 

 ports of New England that year. 



The merchantman, with the wind behind her, gave 

 way and as she passed under the whaler's lee the lookout 



