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- chopping knives, and grapnels; and with the microscopic diligence of a
Leuwenhoeck submits to the inspection of a shivering world ninety-six
fac-similes of magnified Arctic snow crystals. I mean no disparagement
to the excellent voyager (I honor him for a veteran), but in so
important a matter it was certainly an oversight not to have procured
for every crystal a sworn affidavit taken before a Greenland Justice of
the Peace.
In addition to those fine engravings from Garnery, there are two other
French engravings worthy of note, by some one who subscribes himself
“H. Durand.” One of them, though not precisely adapted to our present
purpose, nevertheless deserves mention on other accounts. It is a quiet
noon-scene among the isles of the Pacific; a French whaler anchored,
inshore, in a calm, and lazily taking water on board; the loosened
sails of the ship, and the long leaves of the palms in the background,
both drooping together in the breezeless air. The effect is very fine,
when considered with reference to its presenting the hardy fishermen
under one of their few aspects of oriental repose. The other engraving
is quite a different affair: the ship hove-to upon the open sea, and in
the very heart of the Leviathanic life, with a Right Whale alongside;
the vessel (in the act of cutting-in) hove over to the monster as if to
a quay; and a boat, hurriedly pushing off from this scene of activity,
is about giving chase to whales in the distance. The harpoons and
lances lie levelled for use; three oarsmen are just setting the mast in
its hole; while from a sudden roll of the sea, the little craft stands
half-erect out of the water, like a rearing horse. From the ship, the
smoke of the torments of the boiling whale is going up like the smoke
over a village of smithies; and to windward, a black cloud, rising up
with earnest of squalls and rains, seems to quicken the activity of the
excited seamen.
CHAPTER 57. Of Whales in Paint; in Teeth; in Wood; in Sheet-Iron; in
Stone; in Mountains; in Stars.
On Tower-hill, as you go down to the London docks, you may have seen a
crippled beggar (or _kedger_, as the sailors say) holding a painted
board before him, representing the tragic scene in which he lost his
leg. There are three whales and three boats; and one of the boats
(presumed to contain the missing leg in all its original integrity) is
being crunched by the jaws of the foremost whale. Any time these ten
years, they tell me, has that man held up that picture, and exhibited
that stump to an incredulous world. But the time of his justification
has now come. His three whales are as good whales as were ever
published in Wapping, at any rate; and his stump as unquestionable a
stump as any you will find in the western clearings. But, though for
ever mounted on that stump, never a stump-speech does the poor whaleman
make; but, with downcast eyes, stands ruefully contemplating his own
amputation.
Throughout the Pacific, and also in Nantucket, and New Bedford, and Sag
Harbor, you will come across lively sketches of whales and
whaling-scenes, graven by the fishermen themselves on Sperm
Whale-teeth, or ladies’ busks wrought out of the Right Whale-bone, and
other like skrimshander articles, as the whalemen call the numerous
little ingenious contrivances they elaborately carve out of the rough
material, in their hours of ocean leisure. Some of them have little
boxes of dentistical-looking implements, specially intended for the
skrimshandering business. But, in general, they toil with their
jack-knives alone; and, with that almost omnipotent tool of the sailor,
they will turn you out anything you please, in the way of a mariner’s
fancy.
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