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Updated: May 3, 2025
Now, how long d'ye think it would take them? guess." Fred Borders smiled as he said this, and looked round the circle of men. "I know," cried one, "it would take the whole forty thousand a week to do it." "Oh! nonsense, they could do it easy in two days," said another. "That shows how little you know about big numbers," observed Tom Lokins, knocking the ashes out of his pipe.
"That was into his life," remarked Tom Lokins, as we sat waiting for him to come up again. The captain's boat was close to ours, about ten yards off. We had not to wait long. The sudden stoppage and slacking off of all the lines showed that the whale was coming up. All at once I saw a dark object rising directly under the captain's boat.
It was a dead calm, and one of those intensely dark, hot nights, that cause sailors to feel uneasy, they scarce know why. I began to feel so uncomfortable at last, listening to the horrible tales which Tom Lokins was relating to the men, that I slipt away from them with the intention of going on deck.
"Moreover," said I, "a whale is so big and strong, that it can knock a boat right up into the air, and break in the sides of a ship. One day a whale fell right on top of one of our boats and smashed it all to bits. Now that's a real truth!" Again my mother looked at Tom Lokins, and again that worthy man puffed an immense cloud of smoke, and nodded his head more decidedly than before.
Sometimes, when I sit in the chimney-corner of a winter evening, smoking my pipe with my old messmate Tom Lokins, I stare into the fire, and think of the days gone by, till I forget where I am, and go on thinking so hard that the flames seem to turn into melting fires, and the bars of the grate into dead fish, and the smoke into sails and rigging, and I go to work cutting up the blubber and stirring the oil-pots, or pulling the bow-oar and driving the harpoon at such a rate that I can't help giving a shout, which causes Tom to start and cry:
"Nothing, I only forgot to ask your name." "Tom Lokins," he bellowed, in the hoarse voice of a regular boatswain, "w'ich wos my father's name before me." So saying, he departed, whistling "Rule Britannia" with all his might. Thus the matter was settled. Six days afterwards, I rigged myself out in a blue jacket, white ducks, and a straw hat, and went to sea.
"Give way, boys! spring your oars," cried the captain; "another touch or two with the lance, and that fish is ours." The boat shot ahead, and we were about to dart a second harpoon into the whale's side, when it took to "sounding", which means, that it went straight down, head foremost, into the depths of the sea. At that moment Tom Lokins uttered a cry of mingled anger and disappointment.
The other boats had got separated, chasing the little whales, so we had this one all to ourselves. "There she blows!" said Tom Lokins, in a low voice, as the fish came up a short distance astern of us. We had overshot our mark, so, turning about, we made for the whale, which kept for a considerable time near the top of the water, spouting now and then, and going slowly to windward.
Now, how long d'ye think it would take them? guess." Fred Borders smiled as he said this, and looked round the circle of men. "I know," cried one; "it would take the whole forty thousand a week to do it." "Oh! nonsense, they could do it easy in two days," said another. "That shows how little you know about big numbers," observed Tom Lokins, knocking the ashes out of his pipe.
And it was now that my friend Tom Lokins came out strong, and went on at such a rate, that he quite won the hearts of our guests. Tom was not noisy, and he was slow in his talk, but he had the knack of telling a good story; he never used a wrong word, or a word too many, and, having a great deal of humour, men could not help listening when he began to talk.
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