Peter the Whaler Part 21

The line-managers are stationed in the hold, and guide the tube or lull to the casks they desire to fill. Finally, when no more can fall in, piece after piece is jambed in by a p.r.i.c.ker, and the cask is bunged up.

Sometimes not only are all the casks on board filled, but the blubber is stowed away in bulk in the hold, and even between decks; but this good fortune does not often occur.

It will be seen by any one who has read an account, that the process of preparing the cargo by the whalers in the southern seas is very different. Andrew Thompson had once been in a South Sea whaler, and he told me he never wished to go in another; for a wilder, more mutinous set of fellows it was never his ill-luck, before or since, to meet.

This was, of course, owing partly to the captain, who was a rough, uncultivated savage, and totally unfit to gain any moral restraint over his men.

"I'll tell you what it is, Peter," said Andrew, as I sat by him in the forecastle that evening, listening to his yarns, "till the masters are properly educated, and know how to behave like officers and gentlemen, the men will be mutinous and ill-conducted. When I say like gentlemen, I don't mean that they should eat with silver forks off china, drink claret, and use white pocket-handkerchiefs. Those things don't make the gentleman afloat more than on sh.o.r.e. But what I like to see, is a man who treats his crew with proper gentleness, who looks after their interest in this world and the next, and tries to improve them to the best of his power--who acts, indeed, as a true Christian will act--that man is, I say, a gentleman. I say, put him where you will, ask him to do what you will, he will look and act like a gentleman. Who would dare to say that our good captain is not one? He looks like one, and acts like one, at all times and occasions; and if we had many more like him in the merchant service generally, we should soon have an improvement in the condition of our seamen.

"But I have got adrift from what I was going to tell you about the South Sea whalers. You see, the whales in those seas are generally sperm-whales, with blunt bottle-noses, altogether unlike the fish about here. There is not much difference in the way of killing them, except that one has not to go among the ice for them, in the way we have here, as they are met with in 'schools' in the open sea. What we call 'making-off' is there called 'trying-out.'

"You see, on account of the hot climates they have to come through to return home, and partly from the value of the blubber, they have to boil it to get out the oil; and for this object they have to build large stoves or fire-places with brick on deck, between the fore-mast and main hatchway; and above them are three or four large pots. The blubber is then, you see, minced up, and pitched into the pots with long forks.

Just fancy what a curious scene there must be while the trying-out is going on at night--the red glare of the fires, and the thick lurid smoke ascending in dense columns round the masts! Any one, not knowing what was going forward, would think, to a certainty, the ship was on fire; and then the stench of the boiling oil, hissing and bubbling in the pots--the suffocating feel of the smoke--the fierce-looking, greasy, unwashed men--I say, those who have been in a South Sea whaler will never wish to go again."

I told him that I had no wish, after his description, ever to belong to one, though I liked the life, as far as I had seen of it, where I was.

"I have not a word to say against it, mate," replied Andrew. "But wait a bit till we come to boring and cutting through the ice, in case we are beset, and then you'll say that there is something like hard work to be done."

It took us two hours to kill our first whale, and four to flense it. We afterwards performed the last operation in less time, when all hands were more expert.

The next morning we again stood in towards the ice, to see if there was any opening through which we might force the ship, but none appeared.

What was curious, we hit the spot to which the krang of the fish we had killed the day before had floated. We saw something moving on the ice, as we approached, besides the clouds of wild-fowl which hovered over it, and on the sea around.

We pointed it out to the second mate. He took his gla.s.s, and, putting it to his eye, exclaimed, "There's a big white bear has just been breakfasting, and has hauled up some of the krang on the ice, to serve him for dinner; but we'll try what we can do to spoil his sport."

In accordance with this resolution, he went to the captain and asked leave to take a boat to try and bring back Bruin, dead or alive.

"You may bring him back dead, but alive you'll never get him into that boat, depend on it," answered Captain Rendall, laughing. "However, take care he is not too much for you; for those bears are cunning fellows, remember; and I should advise you to take a couple of muskets, and some tough lances."

"Never fear, sir," answered the mate, preparing to lower a boat. "I don't think a boat's crew need, any day, be afraid of a single bear."

Volunteers being asked for, Terence and I, old David and Stokes, and three others, jumped into the boat, and pulled off towards where the bear was seated quietly licking his paws after his meal. The mate had a great idea of noosing him; and for this purpose he and David were each armed with a coil of rope, with a bight to throw over his head, like a la.s.so, while Terence and I were to take charge of the guns. The mate first made us put him on the ice some few hundred yards on one side of the bear, and then we pulled round to the same distance on the other.

Each had a lance besides his la.s.so, and the mate had a pistol in his belt.

In case of extreme necessity, Terence and I were to fire, and then to land and come to their rescue. As soon as the two had landed, they began to move away from the edge, hoping thereby to cut Bruin off should he attempt to escape. He had, however, no inclination to leave his dinner; though, perhaps, had he not already eaten to repletion, he would not have sat so quiet while we approached.

We meantime pulled close up to the krang, among all the ducks and gulls.

This Bruin did not mind, but sat still, looking quietly on. Of course I could then easily have shot him; but that was not the mate's object.

All he did was to growl and show his teeth, as if he longed to have us all within his paws. This made us bolder and less cautious, so we got close up to him.

"We are still too far for me to heave the bight over his shoulders,"

cried Terence. "Just see if you can't get hold of his dinner with the boat-hook, and that will bring him nearer."

I luckily held my gun in my left hand, while with my right, as I sprang on the ice, I attempted to catch hold of the whale's flesh with the boat-hook. This was too much for the equanimity even of Bruin, and with a loud growl he sprang towards the boat, happily thinking me too insignificant for punishment. I immediately ran off towards the mate; while so great was the impetus which the bear had gained, that he went head-foremost into the water, just catching the gunwale of the boat as the men in her tried to shove off to avoid him.

Terence seized his musket, but it missed fire; and before either of the others could get their lances ready, Bruin had actually scrambled on board. No one can be surprised at their fright, nor that, as the bear came in on one side, they should jump out on the other. They were all good swimmers, so they struck out for the ice, on to which the mate and I hauled them, while Bruin floated away in our boat.

We thought he would have jumped out again, and attacked us: but he seemed perfectly content with his victory, and inclined for a cruise, as he sat, with the greatest composure, examining the different articles in the boat. How long he might have sat there I do not know, had not the mate ordered me to try my skill as a shot. It was a long time since I had had a gun in my hand, and my ambition was roused. I took a steady aim at poor Bruin's eye, and he sunk down in the bottom of the boat.

The whole occurrence had been seen from the ship by our captain, who despatched a boat to our a.s.sistance. We stood meantime, looking very foolish, on the ice; and those who had been in the water shivering not a little with the cold. After the boat had taken us on board, we pulled towards ours, with the bear in it. We half-expected to see him jump up, and, seizing the oars, pull away from us. Terence declared that he knew a man who said that such a thing had once happened, and that the bear, after a chase of many miles, got clean off with the boat; and that next year, about the same lat.i.tude, he was seen cruising about by himself, fishing for seals.

However, we got cautiously up to our boat; and there lay Bruin, breathing out his last. By the time we got alongside, he was quite dead. We all, especially the mate, got well laughed at for having had our boat captured by a bear.

"And so, Mr Derrick," said the captain, "a boat's crew can possibly be beaten by a bear, I see."

"They can, sir," answered the mate; "I own it; but if you'll remember, you said I should never get that bear into the boat, alive or dead, and I've done both."

"Not that," replied the captain. "He got himself in, and he got you out; so I don't see that you've fulfilled your promise."

However, Bruin was hoisted on board, and the mate secured his skin, which was what he wanted. Of course the adventure caused much joking afterwards, and the boat was ever afterwards called "the bear's boat."

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

For several days, during which we captured another whale, we were cruising about, in the hopes of finding a pa.s.sage through the ice. We were now joined by a squadron of six other ships, all bent on the same object that we were, to find our way across Baffin's Bay to a spot called Pond's Bay, which has been found, of late years, to be frequented by a large number of whales.

I have before forgot to mention the great length of the days; indeed, for some time past there had scarcely been any night. Now, for the first time in my life, I saw the sun set and rise at midnight. It was my first watch; and, as eight bells were struck, the sun, floating majestically on the horizon, began again its upward course through the sky. On the other side the whole sky was tinged with a rich pink glow, while the sky above was of a deep clear blue. I could scarcely tear myself from the spectacle, till old David laughed heartily at me for remaining on deck when it was my watch below. Now was the time to push onward, if we could once penetrate the ice. We had worked our way to the east, in the hopes of there finding a pa.s.sage.

"Land on the starboard bow!" shouted the second mate from the crow's-nest. Still on we sailed, till we saw it clearly from the deck.

Lofty black rocks were peeping out from amid snow-capped heights, and eternal glaciers glittering in the sunbeams. In the foreground were icebergs tinged with many varied hues. Deep valleys appeared running up far inland; and above all, in the distance, were a succession of towering mountain ranges, reaching to the sky. Still on we sailed.

"Well, lad, how long do you think it would take you to pull on sh.o.r.e now?" asked old David.

"Better than half-an-hour, in a whale-boat, with a good crew," I answered, thinking the distance was about four or five miles.

The old whaler chuckled, in the way he always did when he had got, what he called, the weather-gauge of me.

"Now I tell you it would take you three good hours, with the best crew that ever laid hand on oar, and the fastest boat, too, to get from this ship to that sh.o.r.e."

"Come now, David, you are pa.s.sing your jokes off on a greenhorn," I replied. "Why, if the water was not cold, I don't think I should find much difficulty in swimming there, when we got a little closer in."

This answer produced a fresh succession of chuckles. Still on we sailed; and I confess that at the end of an hour we appeared no nearer than before.

"Well, what do you think of it now?" asked old David.

"Why, that there must be a strong current against us, setting off sh.o.r.e," I answered, wishing to show my knowledge.

He replied that there was no current, and that I was wrong. Another half-hour pa.s.sed, and still we did not seem to have gained ground.

"What do you think of our being off Cape Flyaway, youngster?" asked David, pretending to be alarmed. "Did you never hear speak of that?

The longer you sail after it the farther off it goes, till it takes you right round the world. If that's it, and I don't say it isn't, it will be long enough before we get back to old England again." Having thus delivered himself, he walked away, to avoid being questioned.

Tom Stokes, who was near me, and, as I have said, was very fond of reading, heard his remark.

"Do you know, Peter, I am not certain that what David says is altogether wrong," he remarked, in a mysterious manner. "I have just been reading in a book an account of a voyage made many centuries ago by a Danish captain to these seas. His name was Rink, but I forget the name of the ship. His crew consisted of eighty stout brave fellows; but when they got up here, some of the bravest were frightened with the wonders they beheld--the monsters of the deep, the fogs, the snows, and the mountains of ice--and at last they saw at no great distance a high picturesque land on which they wished to land, but though they sailed rapidly on, or appeared to sail, they got no nearer to it. This increased the alarm they already felt. One-half of the crew were of opinion that the land itself moved away from them; the others that there were some powerful loadstone rocks somewhere astern, which kept the ship back. At last Captain Rink finding a northerly breeze spring up, and being somewhat short of provisions, put up the helm and ran home, every one on board giving a different account of the wonders they had seen, but all agreeing that it was a region of ice-demons and snow-spirits, and that they would never, if they could help it, venture there again."

For some hours we continued much of Captain Rink's opinion, till at last I had an opportunity of asking Andrew what he thought about the matter.

He then told me that, on account of the clearness of the atmosphere, and the brightness of the snow-covered hills or icy plains, they appear to a person unaccustomed to look on them to be very much nearer than they really are. He a.s.sured me that it would be a long time before I should be able to judge of distances; and that he had known a person mistake a few stunted shrubs appearing above the snow a few yards off for a forest in the distance, while land many miles off appeared, as it had to me, close at hand.

It was evening, or I should rather say near midnight, when we really got close in, when we found that the valleys were magnificent fiords, or gulfs running far inland, and that the rocks and icebergs were of vast height. As we sailed along the coast, nothing could be more beautiful than the different effects of light and shade--the summits of the distant inland ranges shining in the sunlight like ma.s.ses of gold, and the icebergs in the foreground tinged with the most beautiful and dazzling colours.