name I am told is Medusae, that is the learned name. The whale feeds on
them, and that is the reason why the whale is found where they are."

"I should like very much to go a voyage to the whale fishery," replied
I; "I've heard so much about it from you."

"It is a stirring life, and a hard life, Jacob; still it is an exciting
one. Some voyages will turn out very pleasant, but others are dreadful,
from their anxiety. If the weather continues fine, it is all very well;
but sometimes when there is a continuance of bad weather, it is
dreadful. I recollect one voyage which made me show more grey hairs
than all the others, and I think I have been twenty-two in all. We were
in the drift ice, forcing our way to the northward, when it came on to
blow--the sea rose, and after a week's gale it was tremendous. We had
little daylight, and when it was daylight, the fog was so thick that we
could see but little; there we were tossing among the large drift ice,
meeting immense icebergs which bore down with all the force of the gale,
and each time we narrowly escaped perishing: the rigging was loaded with
ice; the bows of the ship were cased with it; the men were more than
half frozen, and we could not move a rope through a block without
pouring boiling water through it first, to clear it out. But then the
long, dreary, dreadful nights, when we were rising on the mountain wave,
and then pitching down into the trough, not knowing but that at each
send we might strike upon the ice below, and go to the bottom
immediately afterwards. All pitchy dark--the wind howling, and as it
struck you, cutting you to the back-bone with its cold, searching power,
the waves dancing all black around you, and every now and then
perceiving by its white colour and the foam encircling it a huge mass of
ice borne upon you, and hurled against you as if there were a demon, who
was using it as an engine for your destruction. I never shall forget
the _turning_ of an iceberg during the dreadful gale which lasted for a
month and three days."

"I don't know what that means, sir."

"Why, you must know, Jacob, that the icebergs are all fresh water, and
are supposed to have been detached from the land by the force of the
weather and other causes. Now, although ice floats, yet it floats deep:
that is, if an iceberg is five hundred feet high above the water, it is
generally six times as deep below the water--do you understand?"

"Perfectly, sir."

"Now, Ja