“Where ’s Macy?” he asked sharply.

Before anybody could answer Mr. Macy’s head popped up, beside the overturned boat. The boat had come down over him, and he had dived out. The men were grabbing oars and pieces of plank—anything that would keep them afloat—and were swimming away from the wreck as fast as they could. Mr. Brown saw that they all had something to hang on to, and that another boat had been lowered from the ship, and was coming up fast.

“You ’re all right,” he said. “Hold on, and I ’ll try to coax him away.”

Macy laughed. “You ’re welcome to it,” he said.

The whale had been lying a short distance away, thrashing his flukes about truculently, and moving from side to side. In the course of his movements he caught sight of the wrecked boat, and it seemed to excite his rage afresh. He at once came down for it, his jaw down, and struck at it with his jaw; but he did but little damage, only smashing another plank, as the boat rolled away. The men were swimming away as fast as they could. The whale came to a short distance from the wreck, turned, and again came down viciously.

He had not seen our boat, although it was in plain sight; at any rate, he had taken no notice of it. Perhaps his mind was so occupied with the immediate object of his wrath that it had no room for anything else. Before he reached the wrecked boat, we struck, the Prince darting both irons, one after the other, with great rapidity, and with all his strength. They almost disappeared in his body, just behind his side fin. This distracted his attention from the wreck completely. He was clearly astonished, and striking the water two tremendous blows with his flukes, and drenching everybody in the boat, he put away to windward at a great pace.

He went so fast, and made so much play with his flukes, that we could not haul alongside. He seemed to be rolling a little as he swam, and the play of the flukes covered the course the boat would have to take. There was nothing to do but the best we could. We hauled up with great difficulty just astern of the great flukes, and Mr. Brown tried pitch-poling the boat spade into his small, to cut the fluke tendons. This was a difficult matter, in a rolling, jumping boat, and in three trials Mr. Brown succeeded only in wounding the flukes, which served to increase the speed. We simply had to haul up close, and we did it somehow, the Prince keeping us clear of the flukes by great exertion at the steering oar. I do not see how he did it, and I did not see at the time, for my back was toward him, and I was putting my whole heart into heaving, to gain a few inches at a time. I very nearly put the flesh of my hands into it, too. By the time the flukes were astern of us, I felt as if all my fingers had been stripped to the bone; as if they were in the same condition they were in the day Jimmy and I got John Appleby’s boat aground on Fort Phœnix shoal.

The line now broke the pin in the chocks, I suppose at a leap of the boat and a heave on the steering oar, and jumped out of the chocks. It brought up on the kicking-strap, pulling over the port bow at a slight angle with the boat, which kept clear automatically. A few inches of clear water showed between the boat and the body of the running whale, whose speed had not slackened in the least. I remember that the wave from the boat and that from the whale, meeting at such close quarters, resulted in a nearly vertical sheet of water, which came steadily over the side, making a nearly continuous cataract down my back until I moved over.

Mr. Brown looked around apprehensively; but seeing that the boat was all right, and that the arrangement would give him an excellent chance to lance, he ordered Kane to take the line and heave a little. That would put him where he wanted to be. Kane, the bow oar, took the line all right, but was unable to heave us any farther forward, and I took hold. Together, we heaved the boat up before any of the others could get hold. Once there, my only idea was to hold us there, close to that whale. Before the Prince had a chance to take in the slack of the line and hold around the loggerhead, out of the depths of my ignorance and thought­less­ness, I did it. I might have known better if I had stopped to think, but I might not, and there was no time to stop and think. I took a couple of turns with the slack around the thwart, and pulled the bight of the line through. It was a slipknot, and could be released by a yank upon the line held in my hand.

We were now holding our position close to the irons—naturally enough—and Mr. Brown seemed to be pleased. He was unaware of my device. He lanced the whale again and again, but was unable to reach the life. The whale was spouting thin blood, but did not seem to be much distressed; not as much as we were, for the boat was taking over the side a plentiful spray, and the bloody vapor of his spout enveloped us. It was like an acid.