Pointing to a vessel anchored near by, the captain continued, “There’s a lot of disaster and misfortune in whaling. I’ve just learned about that ship. Almost no oil, crew deserted, big drafts. That’s what they call a broken voyage! Lucky are we with our ambergris.”
We had now been gone nearly a year from New Bedford, and the prevailing thought with me was that some sorrow might have visited my distant home. I opened my mother’s letter with trembling hands; and it was a mother’s letter, just such a one as a mother writes to her son. All were well, there had been no sickness, she had remembered me in her prayers, she had all confidence in the correctness of my habits, she hoped that I was in excellent health, home was not home without me, it seemed many years since my departure, and only my return would restore her happiness.
I opened my father’s letter without foreboding, for my mother had told me that all was well. It was a father’s letter, just such a letter as a father writes to his son. He hoped that I was diligent and dutiful as a sailor, that my habits were correct, that I was in good health and that I would have little from the slop chest, as they had given me an outfit which cost a good deal of money. He declared that, if people saved when they were young, they would keep on saving during life, that he wanted me so to conduct myself that there would be something coming to me at the end of the voyage, and, if there was, that he wouldn’t claim it, although I was a minor, but would allow me to deposit it in the savings bank in my own name.
After receiving our recruits in the afternoon, we weighed anchor and set sail for the north. The old whaling habit of cruising slowly and shortening sail at night was now abandoned. We crowded on sail and made for the Arctic with all possible speed. As we approached the Aleutian Islands, the weather grew colder, and the men began to look to the slop chest. I noticed that Ohoo called for the warmest outfit, and the poor fellow needed it.
And now a few words about bowheads. It wasn’t until 1843 that whalemen began to know anything about these whales. Indeed, before that time, they were ignorant that the right whale had this great brother. Their haunts were in the North Pacific and in the Arctic Sea. In the year named, a whaler for the first time visited the Okhotsk Sea and found and captured bowheads. Soon after they were discovered and taken off Alaska on what was called the Kodiak ground; and in 1847 a whaler named the Superior entered Bering Strait. It was learned that, during the severe winter weather, these whales largely visited these two grounds in the North Pacific and then in June and July, as the lower Arctic became more or less free from ice, passed through Bering Strait for their summer sojourn. As more and more whalers visited the North Atlantic and the Arctic, the bowheads became more shy and went farther north. The whalers which pursued them were thus drawn into places where there was great danger from ice; and eleven years from the time of our story came the great disaster which even now bears the name of “Whalers Crushed by Ice.”
When we reached Bering Strait there was no longer any night. It is often said that it was at midnight when the first bowhead was taken in the Arctic. How can this be when, at the time we call midnight, it was daylight?
Several of the crew declared that we should now hear the singing whales, and I was anxious for an explanation. I could hardly believe what they told me when they said that bowheads communicate with one another by emitting sounds resembling singing. This is thought to be a signal, when passing through Bering Strait, to notify other whales that they are bound north and that the Strait is clear of ice. There is another explanation of this musical exercise. When a bowhead is struck, other bowheads in the neighborhood are frightened or “gallied”, and the singing is thought to be a signal of danger. I noticed that the cry was something like the hoo-oo-oo of the hoot owl, although longer drawn out and more of a humming sound than a hoot.
I had read about the “killers” and of their fierce attacks upon right whales and bowheads, and assumed, as these battles were rarely witnessed, that I might sail the seas for a life time without ever beholding one. And yet the spectacle was presented soon after we passed the Strait. The “killer,” also called the orca or thresher, is a small whale with a complete set of teeth on both jaws. He isn’t worth anything, and hence is never pursued by man. His favorite victim is the bowhead and what he is after is the bowhead’s tongue. Now it is to be noted that the tongue of a large bowhead is said to weigh as much as a good many oxen. These killers are as cunning and intelligent as they are cruel. Sometimes a pack of them will engage in the attack on a whale, but frequently only three. In our case we saw ahead of us a great splashing of water and an object that would leap up into the air and disappear, and then reappear and repeat the performance. When we got nearer we saw that a fight was going on between a huge bowhead and three killers. The object we had seen was a killer which again and again sprang into the air and descended on the whale’s back with the design apparently of tiring him out. Then we noticed that two creatures had fastened their teeth to the whale’s lips with the purpose of forcing his mouth open. There are few things in the world so powerful as the flukes of a bowhead. The old saying was to beware of a sperm whale’s jaw and a right whale’s or bowhead’s flukes. This unfortunate leviathan was pounding the sea with his great flukes, but not to the injury of his assailants, for they were well out of the way. The flukes were now less active. Soon they ceased to operate; the exhausted bowhead opened his mouth, and the ravenous trio proceeded to feast upon his tongue.
We were now near the whale and, just as a boat was lowered, Kreelman said to me, “That poor fellow is about gone, and it’ll be an easy job to kill him. See the shape of him; he ain’t so long as a sperm, but he’s bigger round and plumper, has thicker and richer blubber and makes more oil, even if it don’t bring so much. But let me tell you this, Fancy Chest, them killers don’t fool much with sperm whales. A sailor told me once of a sight he see. He said two killers and a swordfish tackled a big bull sperm. The killers come on in front and went for the bull’s jaw, and the swordfish come up from below to go for the bull with his sword. He said the bull grabbed one of them killers and made mince meat of him and the other left. One prick of the sword was all the whale needed. He rushed ahead a little and then brought them flukes of his down with tremendous force, and there wasn’t no part of the swordfish left. Better let a sperm whale alone.”
When the boat reached the bowhead, he was nearly dead, and it was an easy matter to despatch him and tow him to the ship. The cutting-in and trying-out were nearly the same as in the case of the sperm whale. The only difference was in handling the head. The great strips of bone were cut out, hoisted on deck, carefully cleaned and stowed away. When the carcass was set adrift, there were no ravenous sharks or noisy birds to be seen; and I thought how much more fitting it would have been, if the great creature had met death in a battle with man rather than fall an ignoble prey to the assaults of what are called the “wolves of the sea.”