him except in the remoter southern seas, and then always at too great a distance to study his countenance. He is never chased; he would run away with rope-walks of line. Prodigies are told of him. Adieu, Sulphur Bottom! I can say nothing more that is true of ye, nor can the oldest Nantucketer.
us ends B I (F), and now begins
B II (Oavo). O. ese embrace the whales of middling magnitude, among which at present may be numbered:—I, the Grampus; II, the Black Fish; III, the Narwhale; IV, the rasher; V, the Killer.
B II (O), C I (G). —ough this fish, whose loud sonorous breathing, or rather blowing, has furnished a proverb to landsmen, is so well known a denizen of the deep, yet is he not popularly classed among whales.
But possessing all the grand distinive features of the Leviathan, most naturalists have recognised him for one. He is of moderate oavo size, varying from fifteen to twenty-five feet in length, and of corresponding dimensions round the waist.
He swims in herds; he is never regularly hunted, though his oil is considerable in quantity, and pretty good for light. By some fishermen his approach is regarded as premonitory of the advance of the great Sperm Whale.
B II (O), C II (B F). —I give the popular fishermen’s names for all these fish, for generally they are the best. Where any name happens to be vague or inexpressive, I shall say so, and suggest another. I do so now, touching the Black Fish, so called, because blackness is the rule among almost all whales. So, call him the Hyena Whale, if you please. His voracity is well known, and from the circumstance that the inner angles of his lips are curved upwards, he carries an everlasting Mephistophelean grin on his face. is whale averages some sixteen or eighteen feet in length. He is found in almost all latitudes. He has a peculiar way of showing his dorsal hooked fin in swimming, which looks something like a Roman nose. When not more profitably employed, the Sperm Whale hunters sometimes capture the Hyena Whale, to keep up the supply of cheap oil for domestic employment—as some frugal housekeepers, in the absence of company, and quite alone by themselves, burn unsavory tallow instead of odorous wax. ough their blubber is very thin, some of these whales will yield you upwards of thirty gallons of oil.
B II (O), C III (N), , N W.
—Another instance of a curiously named whale, so named I suppose from his peculiar horn being originally mistaken for a peaked nose. e creature is some sixteen feet in length, while its horn averages five feet, though some exceed ten, and even attain to fifteen feet. Strily speaking, this horn is but a lengthened tusk, growing out from the jaw in a line a little depressed from the horizontal. But it is only found on the sinister side, which has an ill effe, giving its owner something analogous to the aspe of a clumsy left-handed man. What precise purpose this ivory horn or lance answers, it would be hard to say. It does not seemed to be
used like the blade of the sword-fish and bill-fish; though some sailors tell me that the Narwhale employs it for a rake in turning over the bottom of the sea for food.
Charley Coffin said it was used for an ice-piercer; for the Narwhale, rising to the surface of the Polar Sea, and finding it sheeted with ice, thrusts his horn up, and so breaks through. But you cannot prove either of these surmises to be corre. My own opinion is, that however this one-sided horn may really be used by the Narwhale—however that may be—it would certainly be very convenient to him for a folder in reading pamphlets. e Narwhale I have heard called the Tusked Whale, the Horned Whale, and the Unicorn Whale. He is certainly a curious example of the Unicornism to be found in almost every kingdom of animated nature. From certain cloistered old authors I have gathered that this same sea-unicorn’s horn was in ancient days regarded as the great antidote against poison, and as such, preparations of it brought immense prices. It was also distilled to a volatile salts for fainting ladies, the same way that the horns of the male deer are manufaured into hartshorn. Originally it was in itself accounted an obje of great curiosity.
Black Letter tells me that Sir Martin Frobisher on his return from that voyage, when Queen Bess did gallantly wave her jewelled hand to him from a window of Greenwich Palace, as his bold ship sailed down the ames; when Sir Martin returned from that voyage, saith Black Letter, on bended knees he presented to her highness a prodigious long horn of the Narwhale, which for a long period after hung in the castle at Windsor. An Irish author avers that the Earl of Leicester, on bended knees, did likewise present to her highness another horn, pertaining to a land beast of the unicorn nature.
e Narwhale has a very piuresque, leopard-like look, being of a milk-white ground color, dotted with round and oblong spots of black. His oil is very superior, clear and fine; but there is little of it, and he is seldom hunted. He is mostly found in the circumpolar seas.
B II (O), C IV (K). —Of this whale little is precisely known to the Nantucketer, and nothing at all to the professed naturalist. From what I have seen of him at a distance, I should say that he was about the bigness of a grampus. He is very savage—a sort of Feegee fish. He sometimes takes the great Folio Whales by the lip, and hangs there like a leech, till the mighty brute is worried to death. e Killer is never hunted. I never heard what sort of oil he has.
Exception might be taken to the name bestowed upon this whale, on the ground of its indistinness. For we are all killers, on land and on sea; Bonapartes and Sharks included.
B II (O), C V (T). —is gentleman is famous for his tail, which he uses for a ferule in thrashing his foes. He mounts the Folio Whale’s back, and as he swims, he works his passage by flogging him; as some schoolmasters get along in the world by a similar process. Still less is known of the
rasher than of the Killer. Both are outlaws, even in the lawless seas.
us ends B II (O), and begins B III (D).
D. ese include the smaller whales.—I, e Huzza Porpoise; II, e Algerine Porpoise; III, e Mealy-mouthed Porpoise.
To those who have not chanced specially to study the subje, it may possibly seem strange, that fishes not commonly exceeding four or five feet should be marshalled among W—a word, which, in the popular sense, always conveys an idea of hugeness. But the creatures set down above as Duodecimoes are infallibly whales, by the terms of my definition of what a whale is—i.e. a spouting fish, with a horizontal tail.
B III (D), C I (H P). —is is the common porpoise found almost all over the globe. e name is of my own bestowal; for there are more than one sort of porpoises, and something must be done to distinguish them. I call them thus, because he always swims in hilarious shoals, which upon the broad sea keep tossing themselves to heaven like caps in a Fourth-of- July crowd. eir appearance is generally hailed with delight by the mariner. Full of fine spirits, they invariably come from the breezy billows to windward. ey are the lads that always live before the wind. ey are accounted a lucky omen. If you yourself can withstand three cheers at beholding these vivacious fish, then heaven help ye; the spirit of godly gamesomeness is not in ye. A well-fed, plump Huzza Porpoise will yield you one good gallon of good oil. But the fine and delicate fluid extraed from his jaws is exceedingly valuable. It is in request among jewellers and watchmakers. Sailors put it on their hones. Porpoise meat is good eating, you know. It may never have occurred to you that a porpoise spouts. Indeed, his spout is so small that it is not very readily discernible. But the next time you have a chance, watch him; and you will then see the great Sperm Whale himself in miniature.
B III (D), C II (A P). —A pirate. Very savage. He is only found, I think, in the Pacific. He is somewhat larger than the Huzza Porpoise, but much of the same general make. Provoke him, and he will buckle to a shark. I have lowered for him many times, but never yet saw him captured.
B III (D), C III (M- P). —e largest kind of Porpoise; and only found in the Pacific, so far as it is known.
e only English name, by which he has hitherto been designated, is that of the fishers—Right-Whale Porpoise, from the circumstance that he is chiefly found in the vicinity of that Folio. In shape, he differs in some degree from the Huzza Porpoise, being of a less rotund and jolly girth; indeed, he is of quite a neat and gentleman-like figure. He has no fins on his back (most other porpoises have), he has a lovely tail, and sentimental Indian eyes of a hazel hue. But his mealy-mouth spoils all. ough his entire back down to his side fins is of a deep sable, yet a boundary line, distin as the mark in a ship’s hull, called the “bright waist”, that
line streaks him from stem to stern, with two separate colors, black above and white below. e white comprises part of his head, and the whole of his mouth, which makes him look as if he had just escaped from a felonious visit to a meal-bag. A most mean and mealy aspe! His oil is much like that of the common porpoise.
Beyond the Duodecimo, this system does not proceed, inasmuch as the Porpoise is the smallest of the whales. Above, you have all the Leviathans of note.
But there are a rabble of uncertain, fugitive, half-fabulous whales, which, as an American whaleman, I know by reputation, but not personally. I shall enumerate them by their forecastle appellations; for possibly such a list may be valuable to future investigators, who may complete what I have here but begun. If any of the following whales, shall hereafter be caught and marked, then he can readily be incorporated into this System, according to his Folio, Oavo, or Duodecimo magnitude:—e Bottle-Nose Whale; the Junk Whale; the Pudding-Headed Whale; the Cape Whale; the Leading Whale; the Cannon Whale; the Scragg Whale; the Coppered Whale; the Elephant Whale; the Iceberg Whale; the Quog Whale; the Blue Whale; etc. From Icelandic, Dutch, and old English authorities, there might be quoted other lists of uncertain whales, blessed with all manner of uncouth names. But I omit them as altogether obsolete; and can hardly help suspeing them for mere sounds, full of Leviathanism, but signifying nothing. Finally: It was stated at the outset, that this system would not be here, and at once, perfeed. You cannot but plainly see that I have kept my word. But I now leave my cetological System standing thus unfinished, even as the great Cathedral of Cologne was left, with the crane still standing upon the top of the uncompleted tower. For small ereions may be finished by their first archites; grand ones, true ones, ever leave the copestone to posterity. God keep me from ever completing anything. is whole book is but a draught —nay, but the draught of a draught.
Oh Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience! I am aware that down to the present time, the fish styled Lamatins and Dugongs (Pig-fish and Sow-fish of the Coffins of Nantucket) are included by many naturalists among the whales. But as these pig-fish are a nosy, contemptible set, mostly lurking in the mouths of rivers, and feeding on wet hay, and especially as they do not spout, I deny their credentials as whales; and have presented them with their passports to quit the kingdom of Cetology. Why this book of whales is not denominated the Quarto is very plain.
Because, while the whales of this order, though smaller than those of the former order, nevertheless retain a proportionate likeness to them in figure, yet the book-binder’s Quarto volume in its diminished form does not preserve the shape of the Folio volume, but the Oavo volume does.
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE SPECKSYNDER
Concerning the officers of the whale-craft, this seems as good a place as any to set down a little domestic peculiarity on ship-board, arising from the existence of the harpooneer class of officers, a class unknown of course in any other marine than the whale-fleet.
e large importance attached to the harpooneer’s vocation is evinced by the fa, that originally in the old Dutch Fishery, two centuries and more ago, the command of a whale ship was not wholly lodged in the person now called the captain, but was divided between him and an officer called the Specksynder. Literally this word means Fat-Cutter; usage, however, in time made it equivalent to Chief Harpooneer. In those days, the captain’s authority was restried to the navigation and general management of the vessel: while over the whale-hunting department and all its concerns, the Specksynder or Chief Harpooneer reigned supreme. In the British Greenland Fishery, under the corrupted title of Specksioneer, this old Dutch official is still retained, but his former dignity is sadly abridged. At present he ranks simply as senior Harpooneer; and as such, is but one of the captain’s more inferior subalterns. Nevertheless, as upon the good condu of the harpooneers the success of a whaling voyage largely depends, and since in the American Fishery he is not only an important officer in the boat, but under certain circumstances (night watches on a whaling ground) the command of the ship’s deck is also his; therefore the grand political maxim of the sea demands, that he should nominally live apart from the men before the mast, and be in some way distinguished as their professional superior; though always, by them, familiarly regarded as their social equal.
Now, the grand distinion drawn between officer and man at sea, is this—the first lives aft, the last forward. Hence, in whale-ships and merchantmen alike, the mates have their quarters with the captain; and so, too, in most of the American whalers the harpooneers are lodged in the after part of the ship. at is to say,
they take their meals in the captain’s cabin, and sleep in a place indirely communicating with it.
