ling toward the shore, followed by the entire
fleet of bidarkas, all the occupants of which were singing joyously. Rob
could not in the least understand all this, for it seemed to him the
hunt had met with failure; but there seemed to be some system about it,
for nothing but satisfaction marked the faces of the hunters as they
finally drew up their bidarkas again upon the beach.

"Maybe so two--tree day, him die now," said the chief, at last. Rob did
not even then understand what he later found to be the truth: that what
the Aleut really does with his slate harpoon-head is not to kill the
whale with the wound, but to poison it. If the stone harpoon-head
passes through the blubber and into the red meat the wound is sure to
fester, and in the course of a few days to kill the whale, which then
floats ashore somewhere and is discovered by the waiting hunters.

There continued some sort of system in this hunt, even though it was now
arrested for the time. Men kept an eye out on the bay, where in a few
moments the whale arose, spouting madly, and once more stirring the
water into foam. Swimming on the surface, it then took a long, straight
run apparently for the mouth of the bay. The chief gave some hurried
command, and a dozen boats shot out, whether to head it or to watch it
Rob could not tell, for presently the whale once more sounded, and when
it next arose it was deeper into the bay. The situation now seemed to
please the old hunter.

"Maybe so him stay here now," he said, briefly, though why he thought so
Rob could not tell.

No one made any attempt to pursue the whale after that. The chief,
carefully wiping off the sacred _nogock_, again wrapped it up in its
coverings, made some mysterious passes over it, and restored it to its
place in his bidarka, whence, as Rob now began to understand, the
guilty Jimmy had some time since stolen it.

As the boys met on the beach it must be confessed they were not thinking
of their prisoner or his fate. In their excitement they were chattering
to one another about the hunt, which they all agreed was the wildest and
most peculiar one they had ever seen or heard of.

"You had the best of it all, Rob," said John, enviously. "Our man
wouldn't row up any closer. My, that old whale must have looked big from
where you were!"

"Well, he did, a little bit," admitted Rob, who had lost his cap
somewhere and was now bare-headed.

"That beats bear-hunting," said Jesse, "even although we