Modern Whaling & Bear-Hunting / A record of present-day whaling with up-to-date appliances in many parts of the world, and of bear and seal hunting in the Arctic regions

by W. G. Burn Murdoch

CHAPTER XII

Having put down these recent experiences of modern whaling, which, though not exciting, may at least be instructive, let us return to follow the fortunes of our patient whalers on the St Ebba.

It is September now, and a Wednesday, and early and clear and cold, with no gale, with just a ripple down Lerwick Bay; one or two people are lighting their peat fires and the scent comes off to us on the pure, almost wintry air, and we hoist the Union Jack astern though no one may see it, and let steam into the steam donkey-engine, and up comes the port anchor, then the starboard and there is a pause and a bell rings for stand-by, then half-speed and clash goes the air pressure; then full speed, and the motor settles down to its steady musical beat and hum. We are becoming more easy in our minds now about our air compressor starting the engine, but have not quite forgotten that failure down south-west of Norway, in the heavy weather, and the subsequent twenty-four hours of hand-pumping for air pressure to start the engine.

Now we swing round and head south and east out of Lerwick Bay, past the Bressay Light on our left, and then turn northwards towards Whalsey and the Outer Skerries, making for Yell Sound and the west of Shetland for whales, finners, rorquals or big cetaceans of any kind. I found on my visit to the west coast of Shetland on Sunday, to our whaling station there, that our steam-whalers had left for Norway a week previously. Owing to the rough weather they said the season was over; but they left word that there were still whales about the coast as close as five miles. Now we have lovely weather to-day, though so cold it feels as if we were at the start of the spring fishing rather than arriving at the end of the season. It will be rather rich if we capture a few whales when the others have fled. At any rate we have the joyous sense of freedom from competitors that we trout and salmon fishers feel when we find our favourite pool is unoccupied by another rod.

But, dear brother anglers, could I but tell you of the joy of preparation for whaling! You know how your fingers almost tremble as you undo your casts for the first day’s fishing of the year, and what pleasure there is in all the preparations.

Now we are enjoying a similar pleasure, only our preparations are on a larger scale, fifteen there are of us, all doing something to help. The captain and the writer sit on the bridge and con the chart with thumb and finger, picking up the points—rocks, skerries, beacons. “Steady she is now, keep her heading for Muckle Skerry,” with Isbister, Moa, Nista and Nacka skerries on our left. Another mile or two in this direction and we will turn westwards right through Yell Sound that divides the main island from the island of Yell.

A swell comes from the north and there is a fresh, pleasant ripple, and sea and sky are blue as can be expected up north in September, and everyone is busy, some on deck, some below, engineers at the engine—it takes very little attention. Then there is a jolly hot fire amidship, where the smith is busy at his forge. The mate gives him a hand with the bellows and there is the cheery sound of the ring and beat of red iron on the anvil. The bos’n, a mere lad, of fairest northern type but of much seafaring knowledge, sits in a sunny spot sewing canvas. Hansen beside him is peeling potatoes, and some of the crew bring up bolts of canvas preparatory to the task we have before us of making awnings, awnings against the hot sun of the equator. It is a little difficult up here in the north to believe there is such a thing as hot weather, when we find two ply of winter clothes none too warm in the sun.

We have our three guns in the bow still swaddled in canvas, but we will take that off and get them ready farther up the Yell Sound, and perhaps give my late host a salute as we pass Lochend.

We rather hug ourselves for having at last and at length escaped from official red-tape entanglements and got to the comparative wilds of the west of Shetland.

Last night before we left Lerwick we entertained the Custom House and other officials very modestly, I must here say, and they entertained us too in the way of songs and arguments and stories. A Swedish captain joined the entertainment and our evening meal of cormorants and light beer without making a very wry face at either, and later he gave us songs. He was slightly grizzled, with close-cropped beard and hair, with brilliant blue eyes, and he shook his head and beard and closed his eyes whilst he sang, and hit off some of his notes most exquisitely truly—sang Freuden’s “Der ganger tre Jenter i Solen” (Three maids towards the sun went under the linden trees, and the flowers swept their skirts as they sang tra-la, tra-la, tra-la-la-la), and he quite excelled himself and shook his head twice as hard, in a dainty ditty about a maid who argued she might do many things “For mama did so when she var a flikke” (I think “flikke” stands for our “flapper”), and verses of this he hummed and sang right into the middle of our most solemn debates on international politics. Our friend of the “wyles” and the Bow Bells accent, junior Customs officer, turned out to be Southern Irish, and for the evening at least a strong Home Ruler and Socialist. His song was too blue to catch on, but his Socialism raised Henriksen’s fighting spirit to such heat that we had almost to hold the disputants. But through all the smoke and heated discussion and small amount of beer, our worthy Swede either slept or awakened and sang “So did mama, when she were a flikke,” smiling and shaking his head in a most ingratiating manner.

Then we had a Gaelic song from MacDiarmid of the Isles, and Glen Lyon, and with the Norwegian national song we dispersed, the Swede still smiling, singing about the flikke, and the Cockney from Cork firing off fluent platitudes. Henriksen would hardly believe me when I told him that any Southern Irishman could be just as eloquent and excited on any side of any subject under the sun. I hope they were not all drowned, for they went ashore in a very small, leaky harbour boat, five souls, one pair of oars, and it dark, late and windy.

But to continue our cast round the islands for whales—we motor steadily through Yell Sound and past Haldane’s house at Lochend and its silvery crescent shore, with the little green crofts and low, misty hills beyond. We swing round his bay and blow our horn three times and by-and-by we see two figures, Haldane and his gillie, against the white house with its many little windows in the thick walls and they wave a greeting and we dip our flag three times and proceed west and north till we feel the ocean swell again, and pass Ramna Stacks, the battered sentinels at the north entrance to Yell Sound, home of cormorants and shag. A lumpy sea generally heaves about them, throwing white fountains up their dark sides. Often I have seen them when passing up the coast in whalers, and always they express a rough, rugged aspect of the sea. I have known them change their colour in a most remarkable manner in the space of a few moments, from livid yellow to green and back again, and at their feet lie many shells of great value deposited there in H.M.S. by various cruisers. This is how it happened. One day an admiral came from the outer seas at thirty miles an hour and called on R. C. Haldane and said he’d like to have a shot or two at the Stacks as they were exquisite targets. So Haldane agreed, seeing the matter was one of national service. And one morning, bright and early, my host climbed on board the admiral’s ship, and in the time they had half done breakfast they had travelled from Lochend at a fearful speed to the Stacks, and then their owner saw the islands stagger and change colour; when the war vessels passed them, each decorating the islands with four shells apiece of various explosives, each patent explosive painting the rocks a different tint.

To-day as we pass they seem to be of their natural colour again, sombre black and red with a suggestion of pale green grass on their sloping tops, with streaks of white on the ledges where the sea-birds breed, undisturbed by man.

N. by W. we steer, the wind ahead as usual, with a careful look-out for whales, the wind rising meantime till the sea becomes too rough for harpooning; then we turn tail to the rising sea and fine rain and do a patrol southwards. As it still grows rougher and there is no sign of any kind of life, whales or birds, or whales’ food[8] in the water, and as we have a sheltered anchorage on our lee, we right about, and head for Colla Firth and Lochend for the night.

For we argue that we can make a more certain “departure” from Colla Firth if the weather improves to-morrow morning than we could make after drifting a night in a strong wind in the open sea.

Now we have at last a fair wind almost aft, and up goes our foresail and staysail and cheerily we hoist away at mainsail, all hands pleased to turn back from a nasty sea to a cosy night in shelter. We tramp along in great style, a sailing-ship once more, plus the engine going steadily. We ought to drop anchor in shelter before dark. How big the sails seem to-day, with all the reefs out. Dear me! that foresail must have looked very small indeed in last week’s gale, with all the reefs in, a mere pocket-handkerchief bit of mainsail.

St Ebba lies over with the squalls off shore as we get into the wind again, but she doesn’t roll much and we feel increasing belief in her as a sailing-ship.