A Year with a Whaler

by Walter Noble Burns

"Blow!" added the old negro as he caught sight of the whale spouting again.

"Bowhead and right whale got no teeth," he continued. "Dey got only long slabs o' baleen hung wit' hair in de upper jaw. Sperm whale got teeth same as you and me—about twenty on a side and all in his lower jaw. Ain't got no teeth in his upper jaw a-tall. His mouth is white inside and his teeth stand up five or six inches out o' his gums and are wide apart and sharp and pointed and look jes' like de teeth of a saw. Wen he open his mouth, his lower jaw fall straight down and his mouth's big enough to take a whale boat inside.

"Sperm whale's fightin' whale. He fight wit' his tail and his teeth. He knock a boat out de water wit' his flukes and he scrunch it into kindlin' wood wit' his teeth. He's got fightin' sense too—he's sly as a fox. W'en I was young feller, I was in de sperm trade mysel' and used to ship out o' New Bedford round Cape o' Good Hope for sperm whale ground in Indian Ocean and Sout' Pacific. Once I go on top a sperm whale in a boat an' he turn flukes and lash out wit' his tail but miss us. Den he bring up his old head and take a squint back at us out o' his foxy little eye and begin to slew his body roun' till he get his tail under de boat. But de boatheader too smart fer him and we stern oars and get out o' reach. But de whale didn't know we done backed out o' reach and w'en he bring up dat tail it shoot out o' de water like it was shot out o' a cannon. Mighty fine fer us he miss us dat time.

"But dat don't discourage dat whale a-tall. He swim round and slew round and sight at us out o' his eye and at las' he get under de boat. Den he lift it on de tip o' his tail sky-high and pitch us all in de water. Dat was jes' what he been working for. He swim away and turn round and come shootin' back straight fer dat boat and w'en he get to it, he crush it wit' his teeth and chew it up and shake his head like a mad bulldog until dere warn't nothin' left of dat boat but a lot o' kindlin' wood. But dat warn't all. He swim to a man who wuz lying across an oar to keep afloat and he chew dat man up and spit him out in li'l pieces and we ain't never see nothin' o' dat feller again.

"Guess that whale was goin' to give us all de same medicine, but he ain't have time. De udder boats come up and fill him full o' harpoons and keep stickin' der lances into him and kill him right where he lays and he never had no chance to scoff the rest o' us. But if it ain't fer dem boats, I guess dat feller eat us all jes' like plum duff. Sperm whale, some fighter, believe me.

"Dere he white waters—blow!" added Gabriel as the whale came to the surface again.

"Sperm whale try out de bes' oil," the garrulous old whaleman went on. "Bowhead and right whale got thicker blubber and make more oil, but sperm whale oil de bes'. He got big cistern—what dey call a 'case'—in de top ob his head and it's full o' spermaceti, sloshing about in dere and jes' as clear as water. His old head is always cut off and hoist on deck to bale out dat case. Many times dey find ambergrease (ambergis) floating beside a dead sperm whale. It's solid and yellowish and stuck full o' cuttle feesh beaks dat de whale's done swallowed but ain't digest. Dey makes perfume out o' dat ambergrease and it's worth its weight in gold. I've offen seen it in chunks dat weighed a hundred pounds.

"You see a sperm whale ain't eat nothin' but cuttle feesh—giant squid, dey calls 'em, or devil feesh. Dey certainly is terrible fellers—is dem devil feesh. Got arms twenty or thirty feet long wit' sucking discs all over 'em and a big fat body in de middle ob dese snaky arms, wit' big pop-eyes as big as water buckets and a big black beak like a parrot's to tear its food wit'. Dose devil feesh. Dey certainly is terrible fellers—is dem sperm whale nose 'em out and eat 'em. Some time dey comes to de top and de whale and de cuttle feesh fights it out. I've hearn old whalers say dey seen fights between sperm whale and cuttle feesh but I ain't never seen dat and I reckon mighty few fellers ever did. But when a sperm whale is killed, he spews out chunks o' cuttle feesh and I've seen de water about a dead sperm thick wit' white chunks of cuttle feesh as big as a sea ches' and wit' de suckin' disc still on 'em.

"Blow!" said Gabriel again with his eyes on the whale. "Dat feesh certainly some traveler."

We were hauling closer to the whale. I could see it distinctly by this time and could note how square and black its head was. Its appearance might be compared not inaptly to a box-car glistening in the sun under a fresh coat of black paint. It did not cut the water but pushed it in white foam in front of it.