"When Sol ain't talkin', gentlemen," retorted the person thus alluded to, "ye'll know he's sick,"
"Wall," said Captain Sol, laughing, "I'll spin the yarn, and yaou kin go back on it if yaou kin. As I was sayin', we was aout one day I think a couple o' miles below Barnaby Island. I was a-mummin' for'ard, kinder sleep-in' on and by, and Sam at the helm, when we see a bot a-slidin' into the ripple right ahead of us, and in a minute a couple of white heads was dodgin' up a little to the wind'ard. Sam trimmed the sheet and hauled the Howlin' Mary—that's what we called the bot—-on the wind, and the other bot did the same, both of us makin' for the same spot. I see it was nip and tuck; and, knowin' that Sam was a master-hand, I says. ' Sam, yaou take the iron.' So we shifted.
"The other bot had a trifle the weather-gage of us, but both of us, mind ye, makin' for where we thought the critter was comin' up to blow, and in a minute, sure enough, up it come. This 'ere other bot shot right across aour bows; but, Lord bless ye, it would take a proper good Injun to beat Sam, for he up, hauls back, and let fly the harpoon clean over the other hot, takin' the critter right alongside the blow-hole so neat that the line fell across the other bot.—Naow, deny it if yaou kin," said Captain Sol, turning to his friend.
"Ye're a master-hand at talkin'," retorted Captain Sam. "I ain't denyin' of it; but it was luck, good luck, that's all."
By this time the white whale had succumbed, and lay upon the surface motionless and dead; and upon the boat being hauled alongside the huge creature was taken in tow and soon stranded upon the beach, where the valuable parts were secured,—the liver and blubber for the oil, and the thick, white skin that was to be tanned and made into leather or used in the manufacture of various articles.
The evening following, upon invitation, we visited the cabin of Captain Sol, who was a widower and kept bachelor's hall, so to speak. We found him seated on a keg, by the side of an enormous caldron that might have contained the witches' compound, judging from the strange forms of steam that arose from it, while the lurid flames beneath, fed by the oily drippings, lent a still greater weirdness to the scene.
"Good-evenin', gentlemen," said the captain, rising quickly as we entered. "I was settin' here in a sog like, and didn't hear ye. It's a master-night, and we're goin' to have good weather to-morrow. If yaou want to try it ag'in, ye're welcome.
"Sam? Sartin; he's goin'. Him and me's jest like the figger ten: if yaou haul off the one we ain't good for nothin'. If yaou want to see a faithful friend, jest clap yer eyes on Sam Whittlefield. And that ain't all," continued the skipper, looking around and speaking low. "Ye might not think it, for he's master-modest, but Sam's got larn-in' that there ain't many in aonr taown kin grapple with. Yaou oughter see his lib'ry. A full set o' the records of Congress from 1847 up to 1861; and he'd have had 'em all, only he jined the navy and couldn't keep 'em up. Then there's a history by Mister Parley, and a hull secretaryfull of books of all kinds. Oh, Sam's literary; there ain't no gittin' raound that.
"Yaou might hear him speak of their son John? Wall, he was a chip o' the old block. He was as wild a yonker as they make 'em; but Sam never laid the whip on him; he argued with him and eddicated him on a literary principle. When John did anything reckless like, the old lady'd fetch aout a sartin book, called 'The Terrible Suffering of Sary Perbeck,'—like enough ye've heard on it,—and I tell ye that tuck the conceit aout of him. She belonged to old Quaker stock of Paris, Maine, and she kept it up till John was a man grown and she lost her eyesight. She made a good boy of him; but the poor feller went down with the rest in the gale of 1875, on the Grand Banks. John had hard luck. The first v'yage he made, the schooner was struck by a sea on the Banks, capsized, and rolled completely under, comin' up the other side, so't the men below dropped out of their bunks on ter the ceilin', and then back ag'in as she righted.[A] The hatches were battened down, and they found John lashed to the wheel, half drowned. The next trip all hands foundered. They reckoned she went down at the anchorage.
[Footnote A: The schooner Daniel A. Burnam had a similar experience in 1877. She rolled completely over and righted herself without the loss of a man.]