- end_line
- 8377
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:49:30.768Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 8336
- text
- unknown rocks and breakers; for the second time his ship was utterly
lost, and forthwith forswearing the sea, he has never tempted it since.
At this day Captain Pollard is a resident of Nantucket. I have seen
Owen Chace, who was chief mate of the Essex at the time of the tragedy;
I have read his plain and faithful narrative; I have conversed with his
son; and all this within a few miles of the scene of the catastrophe.*
*The following are extracts from Chace’s narrative: “Every fact seemed
to warrant me in concluding that it was anything but chance which
directed his operations; he made two several attacks upon the ship, at
a short interval between them, both of which, according to their
direction, were calculated to do us the most injury, by being made
ahead, and thereby combining the speed of the two objects for the
shock; to effect which, the exact manœuvres which he made were
necessary. His aspect was most horrible, and such as indicated
resentment and fury. He came directly from the shoal which we had just
before entered, and in which we had struck three of his companions, as
if fired with revenge for their sufferings.” Again: “At all events, the
whole circumstances taken together, all happening before my own eyes,
and producing, at the time, impressions in my mind of decided,
calculating mischief, on the part of the whale (many of which
impressions I cannot now recall), induce me to be satisfied that I am
correct in my opinion.”
Here are his reflections some time after quitting the ship, during a
black night in an open boat, when almost despairing of reaching any
hospitable shore. “The dark ocean and swelling waters were nothing; the
fears of being swallowed up by some dreadful tempest, or dashed upon
hidden rocks, with all the other ordinary subjects of fearful
contemplation, seemed scarcely entitled to a moment’s thought; the
dismal looking wreck, and _the horrid aspect and revenge of the whale_,
wholly engrossed my reflections, until day again made its appearance.”
In another place—p. 45,—he speaks of “_the mysterious and mortal attack
of the animal_.”
Secondly: The ship Union, also of Nantucket, was in the year 1807
totally lost off the Azores by a similar onset, but the authentic
particulars of this catastrophe I have never chanced to encounter,
though from the whale hunters I have now and then heard casual
allusions to it.
- title
- Chunk 3