Beadle's Half Dime Library, No. 25 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

er <= OS eS ae = eS 8 other, ‘‘if you will accept the services of my- self and crew.” ‘I shall be glad to do so,” replied the youth, *fand | thank you for the offer.” While they were conversing, Sinclair no- ticed that Mora, who was near them on deck, was watching his companion with a look of pe- culiar interest. This did not surprise him, as the lieutenant, with his bronzed cheek, square- shouldered, seaman-like form and manly air, was well fitted to attract a gentle girl like Miss Morton. a The rest of the day was spent in rigging a new jib-boom, in place of the one that had been iost. A spare spar aboard was used for this purpose. It was admirably smoothed off by Bolt, who had brought with him from home a whole set of carpenter’s tools. While some of the crew were fitting it, the others were set to work polishing the brass pieces until they shone like mirrors, In fact, thanks to the assistance derived from the new arrivals, the little vessel soon pre- sented a wonderfully improvéd appearance, Before night the young captain had com- pleted the necessary arrangements for his cruise. He left seven lads in charge of the fort, and sailed away, just before dusk, stand- ing off to the north and west. « At about ten o’clock the moon rose, lighting up the snow-white decks of the yacht and the brass pounders, the latter flashing brightly in the silvery rays. Mora was seated aft, conversing earnestly with the lieutenant, her soft, dark eyes turned upon his face, her whole countenance beaming with interest. In fact, since the arrival of this young man, Sinclair had found little op- portunity to engage the attention of the girl, who now seemed rather to shun him than otherwise. ‘Let it be so,” he sadly muttered to himself more than once, Nevertheless he lost much of his cheerful- ness, and went about feeling gloomy and almost irritable. No girl he ever saw had appeared to him so attractive as Mora, and he had, before the lieutenant’s arrival, looked hopefully forward to the time when he would ask her to be his wife, At dawn a thick fog rested on the sea. ‘‘ There is a rock somewhere about here,” re- marked the lieutenant to Sinclair. ‘I passed it, in my cutter, the other day. You had bet- ter be careful, or you'll run upon it.” After a brief consultation with Bolt, the young captain resolved to lower a boat and send some of the crew to see if the rock was near. Luffing up into the wind, he lowered the cut- ter, which had previously been hoisted aboard, and manned it with all hands under the charge of the lieutenant and Bolt, His reason for sending so many of his crew was that there might be men enough in the boat to tow the yacht speedily out of any strong current into which she might be drawn. Just as the cutter disappeared in the fog, Mora Morton, who stood near the weather-rail, exclaimed, ‘‘ What is that?’ Sinclair looked, to see a dark object, indis- tinctly seen in the mist, drifting toward the yacht. ‘“‘Tt is a small whale—a calf!” exclaimed the youth. A harpoon was sticking in the creature, which was quite dead. The captain, getting over the rail, made fast the end of a rope to the harpoon, thus securing the whale alongside. ‘‘ Perhaps, when the fog clears, we will see the vessel whose crew fastened to, and lost that fish,” suggested the youth. “They will be glad to get it, as it is a sperm whale.” Hardly had he spoken, when, not twenty feet distant, the water rippled, then parted, as the enormous head and body of a huge sperm whale shot up from the surface, spouting furi- , ously. ‘*T believe it is the cow whale—the mother of the calf,” said Sinclair, : Beadle,s Half-Dime Library. —— eee As the words escaped him, Mora uttered a ery of dismay, and shrunk closely to her com- panion’s side. The whale, with wide-open jaw, was making straight for the yacht, churning the water furiously with her flukes, as she came on, Nothing could have beeu more hideous or appalling than that bristling jaw, with its for- midable teeth, and that huge head, crusted all over with barnacles, which gave to it the ap- pearance of having hundreds of little eyes. On came the monster, until within a few feet of the vessel’s bow, when, with a sudden, tremendous spring, she threw almost the whole of her enormous body out of water, perform- ing the movement which by whalemen is termed ‘ breaching.” Gigantic and fearful, with her great fins outspread, seemingly poised almost on the end of her flukes, she hovered a moment, towering above the heads of Mora and the captain, who looked up with dismay at this great, living weight about to fall, with crushing force, upon them and the yacht. CHAPTER VII A DESPERATE STRUGGLE. SINCLAIR, seizing the girl by the arm, drew her quickly to the other side of the yacht, just in time to escape the body of the whale. With a terrific crash, the head of the mon- ster struck against the rail, crushing it like an egg-shell, splitting it far along forward. The tremendous weight brought the vessel down on her beam-ends, causing the main boom to swing round against the descending whale, whose head thus got foul of the sheet, when the enraged monster, catching the boom in her jaw, snapped it asunder from the mast, carrying it, with the mainsail, which was thus torn to shreds, into the sea, Disengaging herself from the ropes and can vas, the whale again swam toward the yacht, her jaw, thrust far up from the water, wide open, as before. Sinclair, who had been keenly watching the monster, now perceived that its head was ona line with one of the larboard guns, He ran to the galley, in which there was a fire, and taking a hot coal from the stove, with a pair of tongs, he “touched off” the piece. The gun roared, and the ball flew whizzi on its way, just grazing the barnacled head of the leviathan. Under ordinary circumstances, a noise of this kind would have galled (frightened) the whale, so that she would have sounded (gone down), and not again have appeared near the yacht. It is a well-known fact, however, that, when bent on avenging her slaughtered offspring, the cow whale, as a general rule, cannot be turned from her purpose by anything short of death. Now, therefore, the monster rushed straight on toward the yacht, which, if struck by that powerful head and jaw, must be stoven by the blow. The young captain, realizing this, and cem- prehending that the sight of the calf along- side the vessel, was the cause of the mother’s rage, sprung quickly upon the back of the little whale, endeavoring to unfasten the rope he had tied to the harpoon, But the knot had become so tightened by the strain upon it, that he was unable to loosen. it. Meanwhile, the cow whale, only a few feet distant, had, on seeing Sinclair’s situation, partially turned, and was now making straight for him, to seize and crush him with her terri- ble white jaw. The youth, unable to untie the knot, glanced down at the harpoon, to discover that the shank had worked so loose that it might be pulled out. He gave the weapon a couple of powerful jerks, which freed it from the body of the fish; but he could not now ascend the yacht’s side, for the calf had drifted astern, the rope had at first stood watching the tion of the young captain, suddenly nerved fastened to the harpoon having slacked up, as the pin, to which it was attached, had slipped with the strain upon it, from the broken rail. That he might, at least, have free use uf tha harpoon, Sinclair now severed the rope with the keen edge of the barbed iron, which he then held ready for service, His position on the slippery back of the drifting calf, was an awkward one. He could keep his place only by remaining on his kn with which he braced himself so as to hold his body firm. Before him, now but a few feet distant, was the jaw of the advancing whale, wide open to seize and crush him; he could look down into that white cavern of death, while, amidst the rough protuberances and crust of barnacles on the monster’s head, he could see her spiteful- looking eyes, strangely diminutive, in compar- ison with the enormous bulk of her body. He drew off the harpoon, grasping it with both hands, and, with all his might, darted it slantingly into the creature’s body, just abaft. (behind) the corner of her jaw. Smarting with the pain, the leviathan, her enormous jaw yawing sideways, made a snap at Sinclair, who could now only avoid her by rolling off the back of the calf into the water. Meanwhile, Mora, who, white with terror, rilous situa- herself to attempt the rescue of the youth. Picking up a hatchet, she, with a couple of blows, severed the fall ropes holding the gig to the stern, and, climbing over into the boat, pushed it toward the captain, who was now in the sea. , The light vessel glided alongside the youth, and he got into it. As he did so; up came the whale, which had dove under her calf, rising, with bristling jaw, directly in front of the boat. Having no other weapon of defense, Sinclair picked up a hatchet in the craft, and made with it a blow at the monster, as she rushed at the boat. The blade struck the whale on the upper side of the jaw, but she seemed not to heed the stroke. Down went her head, and up rose her bristling teeth on each side of the frail vessel. Mora shrieked with terror. Sinclair, throw- ing an arm round her waist, made with her for the stern of the boat. In his dismay, however, he perceived that the whale’s flukes were there, and he knew that, if he and his companion should touch them, which they could not help doing, if they should jump overboard, those weighty appen- dages, whose lightest touch is death, would deal them a fatal stroke. The whale’s jaws still remained open. The young captain wondered why their fearful owner delayed crushing the boat, which was now completely in her power. “What shall we do? What can we do?’ gasped the girl, white with terror. Sinclair looked down upon the speaker, his eyes beaming with manly pity. He would try to save her by sacrificing him- self Unwinding his arms from her waist, he sud- denly sprung into the sea, right alongside the whale’s eye! | With an evil, baleful light, gleamed that small eye. Slowly the great open jaws sunk away from the boat, to inclose, the next mo- ment, the form of the youth. Shuddering, he shut his eyes, expecting to feel those terrible fangs crushing his frame. But they did not close upon him, When several moments had passed he opened his eyes, to see the sharp fangs of the upper jaw above him. He swam away. As he did so, the whale turned her great body to dash him to death with her flukes. Sinclair did not wait for her to reach him | with these. He swam at the monster’s half ' submerged body, and flung himself quickly up- on it, Then he drew the hatchet from his belt, in which he had placed it and dealt. blo after blow upon the monster’s hump, 0)(0)(0) ecoim (E “S