The upper jaw of a blue whale, showing the mat of hairlike bristles on the inner edges of the baleen plates.
All through the night the gallant Whale dragged the steamer, with the dead weight of two miles of rope and the engines going half speed astern, and at 9 A. M. the following morning the monster seemed to be as lively and powerful as ever. At 10 A. M., however, its strength seemed to decrease, and at 11 it was wallowing on the surface, where at 12:30 it was finally lanced by the captain. This great fight occupied twenty-eight hours, the Whale having dragged the steamer a distance of thirty miles to Cape St. Mary.
One of the troubles of this form of whaling is the difficulty of avoiding fishing craft when the Whale is struck. In Shetland and Newfoundland captains are not allowed to fire at a Whale within one mile of boats or two miles of the coast, but these precautions are generally ignored. Captain Nilsen, when hunting in the Cabot in Hermitage Bay in 1903, struck a large bull which lay as if dead alongside the steamer. The crew were about to attach the tail to the bow-chains when the Whale suddenly recovered and started full speed for the coast, towing the steamer at ten knots.
After an hour it stopped and lay on the surface of the sea, when Captain Nilsen fired a second harpoon, which only had the effect of waking up the monster. It then went full speed for the fishing fleet, which was close at hand, dived under their nets, and did damage to the extent of a hundred dollars. After a further rush of five miles a third harpoon was fired, which killed the Whale right opposite the factory.[[5]]
[5]. “The Mammals of Great Britain and Ireland.” By J. G. Millais. Longmans, Green, & Co., pp. 256–257.
My friend, Captain H. G. Melsom, tells me that while hunting off the coast of Siberia he struck a blue whale which ran out three thousand feet of line and, with engines at full speed astern, towed the ship forward for seven hours at no time at a less speed than eight knots. Some years before this in Norway he shot a blue whale at five P. M., which dragged the ship with engines at full speed astern, until eleven P. M., when he slowed down to half speed; at one A. M. he changed to dead slow and he finally killed the whale at two o’clock in the morning.
CHAPTER XII
WHAT HAS BECOME OF THE WHALE’S LEGS
If a whale is struck near the tail by the harpoon it is almost powerless to pull because the strain on the rope straightens out its body and the animal can swim only with difficulty. Practically all of the forward motion is developed by means of the flukes and the side fins are only used as balancing organs and in turning and rising to the surface. The flukes are not twisted in a rotary movement like the propeller of a ship, as is commonly believed, but wave straight up and down.
While hunting in Alaska I had an excellent opportunity to see the manner in which a whale swims. I had climbed to the barrel at the masthead while we were following an enormous humpback and as the water was like glass save for the long swell, I could see 15 or 20 feet beneath the surface.