ly as possible, and
rejoiced in being at liberty to take leave of a country from whence one
wrong-headed man has banished cheerfulness and content.

Several whalers were lying in the harbour, and among them the Englishman
we had met with in St. Francisco, and who had then been so unsuccessful.
Fortune had since been more propitious to him, and he was now returning
from the coast of Japan with a rich cargo of spermaceti valued at
twenty-five thousand pounds sterling: he had touched here to take in
provisions for his voyage homewards.

I learnt from another captain the particulars of an accident that had
happened to one of his companions, which shows the dangers whale-fishers
are exposed to, and is a singular example of a providential escape.

A North American, Captain Smith, sailed in the year 1820 in a
three-masted ship, the Albatross, for the South Sea, in pursuit of the
spermaceti whale. When nearly under the Line, west of Washington's
Island, they perceived a whale of an extraordinary size. The boats were
all immediately lowered, and, to make the capture more sure, they were
manned with the whole crew: the cook's mate alone remained at the helm,
and the ship lay-to. The monster, as it peaceably floated on the surface
of the water, was eagerly followed, and harpooned. On feeling the stroke
of the weapon, it lashed its powerful tail with fury, and the boat
nearest it was obliged to dart with all speed out of the way, to avoid
instant destruction. The whale then turned its vengeance on the ship,
swam several times round her with prodigious noise, and then struck her
so violently on the bows, that the cook's mate could compare the effect
of the blow only to the shock of an earthquake. The fish disappeared,
but the tremendous leak the ship had sprung sank her in five minutes
with all that she contained. Her solitary guardian was with difficulty
saved.

The crew were now left in four open boats, several weeks' voyage from
the nearest land, and with no provision but the little biscuit they
happened to have with them. After a long discussion upon the best course
to pursue, they separated: two of the boats steered for the Washington
or Marquesas Isles; and the other two, with the Captain in one of them,
towards the south, for the island of Juan Fernandez. The former have
not since been heard of; but the latter were, a fortnight afterwards,
picked up by a vessel, when the captain and four only of his men were
found alive: