The Arctic Whaleman; or, Winter in the Arctic Ocean

by Lewis Holmes

Each whale boat, when properly pointed, has six men. Some ships man five boats, others four; barks four, brigs three, and schooners two and three.

Each vessel carries nearly double the number of whale boats which it needs. The whale boats, which combine lightness and strength, are always kept hanging over the sides and upon the quarters of the ship, ready furnished for pursuit, so that, on the appearance of a whale being announced from aloft, one or more boats can be despatched in less than a minute.

When a boat approaches the whale sufficiently near to strike, which is sometimes close alongside, and at other times on the top of his back, the boat steerer, who has the forward oar, immediately "peaks" it, and taking his position at the head of the boat, with harpoon in hand, he hurls it with all his energy, and generally with such force and precision, that he buries the fatal iron in the body of the whale, and sometimes he is killed almost instantly.

"The harpoon with which the whale is first struck is a most important weapon, made of the toughest iron, somewhat in the form of an anchor, but brought to an edge and point. Instead of steel being employed, as is commonly supposed, the very softest iron is chosen for this important implement, so that it may be scraped to an edge with a knife. A long staff is affixed to the harpoon by which it is wielded. Connected with the harpoon there is a strong line regularly coiled in the tub; when the whale is struck, and is disposed to dart away or dive down to the depths of the ocean, he carries the iron sticking fast by the barbs, while the coiled line runs out with amazing velocity. From a tub near the stern of the boat, it passes around a loggerhead, and over the seats of the oarsmen, to the bow of the boat, and then a sheeve or pulley is provided, over which it passes to the whale. The friction sometimes is so great in consequence of the rapidity with which the line is carried out by the whale, if by accident it gets out of its place, the bow of the boat is speedily enveloped in smoke, and would burst into a flame provided water was not instantly applied to prevent or allay all friction.

"It is at such a time as this, when by some slight accident the line gets 'foul,' or, by the overturning of the boat, the warp becomes 'tangled' up with the men, many a poor sailor has been carried out of the boat, and carried down into the depths below, and never seen after. Such sad occurrences as these are not wholly unfamiliar with whalemen.

"As soon as the whale is struck, orders are given to 'stern all,' in order to get out of the way of his flukes, or if he is disposed to be frantic and run, to give him the line. Sometimes the lines of several boats are bent on, and more than eight hundred fathoms are run out, and yet the whale would sink the boats were not the line cut. The force that can drag more than three thousand feet of whale warp through the water, including a whale boat, and sometimes more than one, at the rate of ten, twelve, and fourteen miles per hour, must be tremendous. Such is the locomotive energy of the whale. It is supposed that with equal ease he could swim off with a ship.

"When, however, the whale becomes so exhausted, having been perhaps harpooned by some other boats, that the warp can be hauled in, and the boat or boats approach the whale again, the lancer, who is generally one of the mates of the ship, exchanges places with the boat steerer, and takes his position at the bow of the boat, with a lance ten or twelve feet long; as soon as he comes near enough to reach him, he thrusts the slender and fatal steel into the very vitals of the animal; blood mixed with water is discharged from the blow holes, and presently streams of blood alone are ejected, which frequently drench the boats and men, and cover the sea far around. Sometimes the last agony of the victim is marked by convulsive motions with the tail, and violent contortions of his whole body; and, as we have seen, in its dying moments it turns its rage towards the authors of its sufferings. The whale is now in his 'flurry;' he dashes hither and thither, snaps convulsively with his huge jaws, rolls over and over, coiling the line around his body, or leaps completely out of the water. The boats are often upset, broken into fragments, and the men wounded or drowned. The poor animal whirls rapidly around in unconsciousness, in a portion of a circle, rolls over on its side, and is still in death. At other times, after it is lanced, the whale yields up its life quietly, and dies with scarcely a struggle."

Besides harpoons, which are the most important instruments upon which whalemen depend for capturing the whale, the harpoon gun and bomb lance are now used for the same purpose. They are not, however, considered as substitutes for the harpoon, except in cases of emergency, when the whale cannot be approached by a boat, or when he manifests ugliness or ferocity. The harpoon gun, designed to throw a harpoon, is but little used by American ships, though quite generally among English whalers. Nearly all of our whale ships, however, are supplied with the fatal and destructive bomb lance. The gun, into which the lance exactly fits, is heavier, shorter, and its barrel larger than common guns. It is loaded with powder, in the same manner as other guns. The lance is then put into the barrel of the gun, until one end of it comes in contact with the charge of powder; the opposite extremity has three edges, sharp, and tapering to a point. The entire length of the lance is about eighteen inches. The lance is prepared with a hollow tube, extending half or two thirds of the distance through it; and this tube is filled with a combustible material that readily ignites when the gun is fired. When the lance has buried itself in the huge body of the whale, the fire communicates with the explosive part of the filling in the tube, situated about in the centre of the lance, and in a few moments, thirty seconds perhaps, it bursts like a bomb, and destroys the life of the whale. The bomb lance may be fired with effect at a whale, at a distance of about fifty yards or more.

"The huge body is now towed to the ship; a hole is cut into the blubber near the head, into which a strong hook is inserted—a difficult and dangerous operation. A strong tension is then applied to this hook, and by it the blubber is hoisted up, as it is generally cut by the spades in a spiral strip, going round and round the body, the whale being secured alongside of the ship, and somewhat stretched by tackles both at the head and tail. As this strip or band of blubber is pulled off, weighing from one half to two tons, the body of course revolves, until the stripping reaches the 'small,' when it will turn no more.

"The head, which at the commencement of the process was cut off and secured astern, is now hoisted into a perpendicular position, the front of the muzzle opened, and the oil dipped out of the case by a bucket at the end of a pole." A ship has no purchase sufficiently strong to hoist in on deck the head of a large sperm whale. It is so heavy that it would take the masts out of her if attempted, or bring her keel out of water. Besides, it is so bulky that it would more than fill up the entire waist of the ship. The head sometimes contains more than fifty barrels of oil.