For full ten minutes he continued his optical search over the sea,—until not a fathom of the surface had escaped his scrutiny.
At first his glances had expressed almost a confident hope; and, observing them, the others became excited to a high degree of joy.
Gradually, however, the old shadow returned over the sailor’s countenance, and was instantly transferred to the faces of his companions.
The sea,—as far as his eye could command a view of it,—showed neither sail, nor any other object. Its shining surface was absolutely without a speck.
With a disappointed air, the captain of the Catamaran descended from his post of observation; and once more turned his attention to the dead cachalot from which they were now separated by less than a hundred fathoms,—a distance that was constantly decreasing, as the raft, under sail, continued to drift nearer.
The body of the whale did not appear anything like as large as when first seen. The mist was no longer producing its magnifying effect upon the vision of our adventurers; but although the carcass of the cachalot could no more have been mistaken for an island, still was it an object of enormous dimensions; and might easily have passed for a great black rock standing several fathoms above the surface of the sea. It was over twenty yards in length; and, seen sideways from the raft, of course appeared much longer.
In five minutes after, they were close up to the dead whale; and, the sail being lowered, the raft was brought to. Ben threw a rope around one of the pectoral fins; and, after making it fast, the Catamaran lay moored alongside the cachalot, like some diminutive tender attached to a huge ship of war! There were several reasons why Ben Brace should mount up to the summit of that mountain of whalebone and blubber; and, as soon as the raft had been safely secured, he essayed the ascent.
It was not such a trifling feat,—this climbing upon the carcass of the dead whale. Nor was it to be done without danger. The slippery epidermis of the huge leviathan,—lubricated as it was with that unctuous fluid which the skin of the sperm-whale is known to secrete,—rendered footing upon it extremely insecure.
It might be fancied no great matter for a swimmer like Ben Braco to slide off: since a fall of a few feet into the water could not cause him any great bodily hurt. But when the individual forming this fancy has been told that there was something like a score of sharks prowling around the carcass, he will obtain a more definite idea of the danger to which such a fall would have submitted the adventurous seaman.
Ben Brace was the last man to be cowed by a trifling danger, or even one of magnitude; and partly by Snowball’s assistance, and using the pectoral flipper to which the raft was attached as a stirrup, he succeeded in mounting upon the back of the defunct monster of the deep.