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Updated: May 9, 2025
The old whalesman was not long aboard before getting confirmed in his conjecture that the ship was the same whose boats had harpooned and "drogued" the cachalot, the carcass of which had been encountered by the Catamaran.
The two previous ones spent on board the CACHALOT have been passed over without mention, absolutely no notice being taken of the season by any one on board, to all appearance. In English ships some attempt is always made to give the day somewhat of a festive character, and to maintain the national tradition of good-cheer and goodwill in whatever part of the world you may happen to be.
Several whales are well known. The Right is almost exterminated; but the Greenland, or Bow-head, is found along the edge of the ice in all Hudsonian waters. The Pollock is rare, and the Sperm, or Cachalot, as nearly exterminated as the Right.
How he carried out his promise, I do not know; but, for the poor fellows' sakes, I trust he kept his word. And now the cruise of the good old whaling barque CACHALOT, as far as whaling is concerned, comes to an end. For all practical purposes she becomes a humdrum merchantman in haste to reach her final port of discharge, and get rid of her cargo.
With the spermaceti to be extracted from the "case" of the cachalot, they could lay in a stock that would last them for many a day. They had their six casks, five of them still empty. By using a couple of them to contain the oil, the raft would still be sufficiently buoyant to carry all hands, and not a bit less worthy of the sea.
With regard to the wider-spread classes of the great marine mammalia, beyond the fact, ascertained from continued observation, that certain parts of the ocean are more favoured by them than others, there is absolutely no data to go upon as to why at times they seem to desert their usual haunts and scatter themselves far and wide. The case of the cachalot is still more difficult.
"Never heard of such a whale. Cachalot Blanche! White Whale no." "Very good, then; good bye now, and I'll call again in a minute." Then rapidly pulling back towards the Pequod, and seeing Ahab leaning over the quarter-deck rail awaiting his report, he moulded his two hands into a trumpet and shouted "No, Sir! No!" Upon which Ahab retired, and Stubb returned to the Frenchman.
But as perhaps fifty of these whale-bone whales are harpooned for one cachalot, some philosophers of the forecastle have concluded that this positive havoc has already very seriously diminished their battalions.
There was a little obliquity about the direction of the spout that made me hopeful, for the cachalot alone sends his spout diagonally upward, all the others spout vertically. It was but a school of kogia, or "short-headed" cachalots; but as we secured five of them, averaging seven barrels each, with scarcely any trouble, I felt quite pleased with myself.
Subsequent experience satisfied me that such a sight was by no means uncommon here; in fact, "lone whales" or small "pods" were quite the exception. Well, we all "waded in," getting, some two, some one whale apiece, according to the ability of the crews or the fortune of war. Only one fell to our lot in the CACHALOT, but it was just as well.
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