A Whaleman's Wife

by Frank Thomas Bullen

I know very well that there will be many a cynical sneer at this, but that does not matter at all so long as the thing is true. If men (and I care not whether they be white, black, brown, or yellow) are treated like cattle they will yield worse than bovine service; if they are pampered and allowed to feel that they can do as they like, they will, their natural depravity getting the upper hand, become practically worthless; but if, as under Captain Hampden, they are kept under discipline, yet made to feel that their efforts to do well are fully appreciated, they will behave as men should behave who realise to the full the dignity of obeying the call of duty, who realise abundantly how good it is to be a man.

CHAPTER X

THE GOOD SHIP ‘XIPHIAS’

Of definite purpose I have italicised the adjective in the heading of this chapter because I have often feared that readers of ‘The Cruise of the Cachalot’ may have been led to believe that there could not be such a thing as a good whaleship. And yet even there I did try to show how vast a difference a change of captains made. The Xiphias, however, was good from the beginning. A certain amount of unavoidable suffering was endured by the new hands at the beginning of the cruise, consequent entirely upon the sudden violent change in their lives. And perhaps the officers were just a trifle exuberant in their attentions to the helpless, clumsy men they were endeavouring to lick into shape. But there never was any actual cruelty. Discipline once firmly established, and rudimentary ideas of the work they must do instilled into the men’s minds, their lives became as comfortable as a sailor’s life can ever be at sea. They worked hard, but only at necessary duties, and they were never wantonly deprived of needed rest. Their food was none too good, but it was certainly better than usual and always plentiful. Even here the genial spirit of the skipper was able to exercise itself beneficially for the comfort of his men. He and his officers were always on the keenest look-out for fish of any sort, and no effort was spared to catch them, all sorts of fishing tackle being carried for the purpose. He knew, too, many little dodges by means of which sea-fowl could be rendered palatable, and was a past master in the art of devising changes of dietary for his crew.

But more than all this, the man himself was one of those glorious old Yankees who combine with a supreme ability to command their fellows—a power of enforcing discipline among the roughest with splendid, never-failing courage—the simple, fun-loving, joyous instincts of a child: terrible in their just anger to meet as a tiger in the jungle, but happy and light-hearted as any child when their men behave like men. So that Captain Hampden was not merely obeyed, he was loved both by officers and men, and all the more because not one of them would have dared to impose upon him in any way. I speak feelingly, for I know the man, who now, midway between eighty and ninety years of age, is not in his second childhood, but his first, his broad back unbent, his hawk-like eye undimmed, his huge limbs as steady as they were half a century ago. To him the children flock as to one who understands them. They talk to him as to one of themselves, and parents laughingly upbraid him with being foremost among the mischief-loving urchins of the sweet little New England town in which he lives. And I am sure that when the call comes for him to close his long and useful schooling here, he will lie down to sleep with the perfect confidence of a little child. It would be an impertinence to say ‘God bless him,’ for God has blessed him exceedingly abundantly, and made him also a blessing to many thousands who are the happier for his having lived.

But I must get back apologetically to the Xiphias, with her crew girding their loins to the great task in front of them. The cutting-in of the first whale of a voyage is always a serious matter, since the crew, however willing, must needs be educated in the performance of an entirely novel task. I am anxious not to repeat myself, but the work of collecting the spoil from a dead whale is of so wonderful a character—is, in spite of the greasy nature of the surroundings, so truly romantic—that the temptation to dwell upon its description is ever present. To the casual unthinking observer there may seem nothing very wonderful in the operation of cutting-in, except the astounding magnitude of the masses raised from the body and disposed of in the blubber-room and on deck. But really it is a piece of work requiring not merely the utmost skill and care on the part of its directors, but a certain natural aptitude as well, for want of this latter characteristic always entails an enormous amount of extra labour upon the crew. Take, for instance, the preliminary operation of cutting off the huge head. Even with the utmost skill this task demands an amazing amount of muscular force, but if that be wrongly applied it is indeed a heart-breaking job. There is practically nothing to guide the eye in the selection of a line upon which to start cutting down into the body and finding the junction of the neck. And there is in a whale of the size captured by the Xiphias fully six feet of muscular tissue to be severed by the spades before the central bone is reached. In other words, the diameter of the body there is about fourteen feet. A few inches to one side or the other, and the work may take double the number of hours it should do, while the able whaleman will plunge unerringly down through the mass blow after blow of his razor-edged spade until he feels—he cannot see—his blade strike the exact spot in the centre of the joint, a ball-and-socket about fourteen inches in diameter.

So well had Captain Hampden and his officers performed their task that when the crew rushed on deck eager for work the joint had been severed, a hole had been bored through the snout, and the end of a snout-chain was already passed through this hole and dangling down under water, awaiting the turning over of the carcass to be got hold of. This was for the purpose of dropping the head astern when it was cut off, for it is always the last to be dealt with.

Swiftly the chain-sling was passed round the base of the lower jaw, hooked to one of the big tackles, with a cheery shout the windlass levers were manned, and presently, upward pointing, arose the shaft of bone, studded with foot-long teeth, while the officers cut vigorously away at the throat, and started the unwinding of that thick overcoating of rich fat their prize had worn so long. And all the while the busy spades of the skipper and mate went plunging almost with the regularity of a pair of pistons down into the scarph dividing the head from the body, until as the first blanket piece rose alongside the head slipped easily aft and floated, an almost cylindrical mass of some thirty-five tons in weight, at the end of a hawser passed over the taffrail.

All plain sailing now for a time. Merrily clattered the pawls, accentuated by the occasional cries of ‘Heave on yer whale!’ ‘Surge on yer piece!’ ‘’Vast heaving!’ ‘Lower away!’ ‘Walk back!’ and the like, all so definite in their application with seamen, and so utterly unintelligible ashore. So briskly, indeed, did the work go on that in less than an hour from the time that the first blanket piece was lowered into the blubber-room, all hands were gratified to see the great flukes dangling at the end of a tackle, the last joint of the backbone having been cut through and the mountainous mass of black flesh allowed to drift slowly away, torn at by innumerable sharks on all sides, and the centre of a perfect cloud of screaming sea-birds.

Now for the head. Smart as the work had been, there was no time to be lost. Although the whale had been struck at 8 A.M., it was now nearly 3 P.M. Barely three hours of daylight remained; and, besides, on the south-eastern horizon there was rising a mass of cloud, with outlines as sharp and clearly defined as those of a mountain. It loomed ever higher, vast, menacing, and deepening into blackness. But although the skipper could not help casting an anxious glance to windward occasionally, his manner was cheery as ever, and he and his officers toiled as if fatigue was to them a word without meaning. Certainly, whatever other virtues be denied them, the Yankee whaling officers could never be accused of laziness. If they worked their men almost to death they never spared themselves: they always led the way, and showed by their example what a man could do if he tried.