raised by her
nose like that which a Dreadnought or an Atlantic liner raises on the
sea.

"Hold fast, all!" Captain Doane roared.

Every man braced himself for the shock. Henrik Gjertsen, the sailor at
the wheel, spread his legs, crouched down, and stiffened his shoulders
and arms to hand-grips on opposite spokes of the wheel. Several of the
crew fled from the waist to the poop, and others of them sprang into the
main-rigging. Daughtry, one hand on the rail, with his free arm clasped
the Ancient Mariner around the waist.

All held. The whale struck the _Mary Turner_ just aft of the
fore-shroud. A score of things, which no eye could take in
simultaneously, happened. A sailor, in the main rigging, carried away a
ratline in both hands, fell head-downward, and was clutched by an ankle
and saved head-downward by a comrade, as the schooner cracked and
shuddered, uplifted on the port side, and was flung down on her starboard
side till the ocean poured level over her rail. Michael, on the smooth
roof of the cabin, slithered down the steep slope to starboard and
disappeared, clawing and snarling, into the runway. The port shrouds of
the foremast carried away at the chain-plates, and the fore-topmast
leaned over drunkenly to starboard.

"My word," quoth the Ancient Mariner. "We certainly felt that."

"Mr. Jackson," Captain Doane commanded the mate, "will you sound the
well."

The mate obeyed, although he kept an anxious eye on the whale, which had
gone off at a tangent and was smoking away to the eastward.

"You see, that's what you get," Grimshaw snarled at Nishikanta.

Nishikanta nodded, as he wiped the sweat away, and muttered, "And I'm
satisfied. I got all I want. I didn't think a whale had it in it. I'll
never do it again."

"Maybe you'll never have the chance," the captain retorted. "We're not
done with this one yet. The one that charged the _Essex_ made charge
after charge, and I guess whale nature hasn't changed any in the last few
years."

"Dry as a bone, sir," Mr. Jackson reported the result of his sounding.

"There she turns," Daughtry called out.

Half a mile away, the whale circled about sharply and charged back.

"Stand from under for'ard there!" Captain Doane shouted to one of the
sailors who had just emerged from the forecastle scuttle, sea-bag in
hand, and over whom the fore-topmast was swaying giddily.

"He's packed for the get-away," Daughtry murmured to the Ancient Mariner.
"Lik