THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 255 
of them appearing to be actually lifted quite on the 
surface of the water, from the great power of the 
rowers; and we had the satisfactich of observing, 
that our boats were quite equal to the others in 
the speed with which they were propelled. But it 
was again a useless task, as the Whale had outwitted 
those in the boats, by having gone, while under 
water, much further than any of his pursuers had 
anticipated, and they again had the mortification of 
witnessing the turning of his flukes, as he once more 
descended into the depths of his vast domain. We 
now knew to a minute the time that he would remain 
below, while the people in the boats continued to 
row slowly onwards the whole time. A fine breeze 
now sprang up, so that we were enabled to keep 
company with the boats, keeping a little to wind- 
ward of them, as the Whale was going ‘on a wind,’ 
as a seaman would say, meaning that it was blowing 
across him. 
_ “When the hour and ten minutes had again nearly 
past, the nine boats were nearly abreast of each 
other, and not much separated, so that the success 
of first striking the Whale depended very much 
upon the swiftest boat, especially if the Whale came 
up ahead. We had now all the boats on our lee- 
beam, while the ships were all astern of us, the most 
distant not being more than half a mile, so that we 
enjoyed an excellent view of this most exciting and 
animated scene. True to his time, the leviathan 
at length arose right ahead of the boats, and at 
not more than a quarter of a mile distant from them. 
The excitement among the crews of the various 
