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Updated: June 8, 2025
Our anchors and cables were, however, always kept ready for use now, in case of an unsuspected current or sudden storm; but beyond that precaution, I could see little or no difference in the manner of our primitive navigation. We met with no "luck" for some time, and the faces of the harpooners grew daily longer, the great heat of those sultry waters trying all tempers sorely.
Chief among these harpooners was Amos Parr, a short, thick-set, powerful man of about thirty-five, who had been at sea since he was a little boy, and had served in the fisheries of both the Northern and Southern Seas.
I have at times heard him let drop expressions which induced me to believe that he is a Christian man. Your father has spoken of him as a Methodist, and observed that, though he did not think much of his opinions, he was the most sober and steady man he ever had with him, and one of his best boat-steerers and harpooners.
According to my judgment, there is no reason why the voyage should not be at once resumed; especially, as I shall see that you have two more harpooners, and enough good men to man three boats. As for the sick, neither you nor I have anything to do with them; they will be attended to by Doctor Johnson; but I've explained that matter before.
At sea, the best English they speak is the South Seaman's slogan in lowering away, "A dead whale, or a stove boat!" Game to the marrow, these fellows are generally selected for harpooners; a post in which a nervous, timid man would be rather out of his element. In darting, the harpooner, of course, stands erect in the head of the boat, one knee braced against a support.
Supposing one to exist ten times as large as any that had ever been captured, with its tusk proportionately powerful, it was conceivable that such a gigantic creature, moving at a great rate, could do all the damage that had been reported. There was among our crew one Ned Land, a gigantic Canadian of forty, who was considered to be the prince of harpooners.
Of a sudden the wind changed to the southward, and the small icebergs which were then to windward rapidly closed with the large one upon which we were fishing. The harpooners observed it, and recommended me to return to the ship, but I was so amused with the sport that I did not heed their advice.
Two harpooners attended the try-pots, replenishing them with minced blubber from the hopper at the port side, and baling out the sufficiently boiled oil into the great cooling tank on the starboard. One officer superintended the mincing, another exercised a general supervision over all.
Up till this time we had no sort of an idea as to where our first objective might be, but from scraps of conversation I had overheard among the harpooners, I gathered that we were making for the Cape Verde Islands or the Acores, in the vicinity of which a good number of moderate-sized sperm whales are often to be found.
Even the harpooners, who are the oldest and steadiest among them, are joining in the general agitation. Apart from this absurd outbreak of superstition, things are looking rather more cheerful.
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