Ben identified the latter as the “drogues,” that form part of the equipment of a regular whale-ship. He knew them well, and their use. Before becoming a man-o’-war’s-man, he had handled the harpoon; and was perfectly au fait to all connected with the calling of a whaler.
“Yes,” resumed he, on recognising the implements of his ci-devant profession, “it ha’ been jest as I said. A whaler ’a been over this ground, and killed the spermacety. Maybe I’m wrong about that,” he added, after reflecting a short while. “I may be wrong about the ship being over this very ground. I don’t like the look o’ them drogues.”
“De drogue?” inquired the Coromantee. “Dem block o’ wood dat am driffin’ about? Wha’ for you no like dem, Massa Brace?”
“But for their bein’ thear I could say for sartin a ship had been here.”
“Must a’ been!” asserted Snowball. “If no’, how you count for de presence ob de flag and de hapoons?”
“Ah!” answered the sailor, with something like a sigh; “they kud a’ got thear, without the men as throwed ’em bein’ anywhere near this. You know nothin’ o’ whalin’, Snowy.”
This speech put Snowball in a quandary.
“You see, nigger,” continued the sailor, “the presence o’ them drogues indercates that the whale warn’t dead when the boats left her.” (The ci-devant whaler followed the fashion of his former associates, in speaking of the whale, among whom the epicene gender of the animal is always feminine.) “She must a’ been still alive,” continued he, “and the drogues were put thear to hinder her from makin’ much way through the water. In coorse there must a’ been a school o’ the spermacetys; and the crew o’ the whaler didn’t want to lose time with this ’un, which they had wounded. For that reason they have struck her with this pair o’ drogued harpoons; and stuck this whift into her back. On fust seein’ that, I war inclined to think different. You see the whift be stickin’ a’most straight up, an’ how could that a’ been done by them in the boats? If the whale hadn’t a’ been dead, nobody would a’ dared to a clombed on to her an’ fix the flag that way.”
“You are right dar,” interrupted Snowball.
“No,” rejoined the sailor, “I ain’t. I thought I war; but I war wrong, as you be now, Snowy. You see the flag-spear ain’t straight into the back o’ the anymal. It’s to one side, though it now stand nearly on top; because the body o’ the whale be canted over a bit. A first-rate ‘heads-man’ o’ a whale-boat could easily a’ throwed it that way from the bottom o’ his boat, and that’s the way it ha’ been done.”