But all our gear was of the very best; no
thieving ship-chandler had any hand in supplying our outfit with
shoddy rope and faulty chain, only made to sell, and ready at the
first call made upon it to carry away and destroy half a dozen
valuable lives. There was one coil of rope on board which the
skipper had bought for cordage on the previous voyage from a
homeward-bound English ship, and it was the butt of all the
officers' scurrilous remarks about Britishers and their gear. It
was never used but for rope-yarns, being cut up in lengths, and
untwisted for the ignominious purpose of tying things up
--"hardly good enough for that," was the verdict upon it.
Tired as we all were, very little sleep came to us that night--we
were barely seasoned yet to the exigencies of a whaler's life
--but afterwards I believe nothing short of dismasting or running
the ship ashore would wake us, once we got to sleep. In the
morning we commenced operations in a howling gale of wind, which
placed the lives of the officers on the "cutting in" stage in
great danger. The wonderful seaworthy qualities of our old ship
shone brilliantly now. When an ordinary modern-built sailing-
ship would have been making such weather of it as not only to
drown anybody about the deck, but making it impossible to keep
your footing anywhere without holding on, we were enabled to cut
in this whale.
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