and drag
it down bodily under the waves. Sometimes a coil of it gets round a
leg or an arm of the man who attends to it, in which case his
destruction is almost certain. Many a poor fellow has lost his life in
this way.

The order was now given to "hold on line". This was done, and in a
moment our boat was cleaving the blue water like an arrow, while the
white foam curled from her bows. I thought every moment we should be
dragged under; but whenever this seemed likely to happen, the line was
let run a bit, and the strain eased. At last the fish grew tired of
dragging us, the line ceased to run out, and Tom hauled in the slack,
which another man coiled away in its tub. Presently the fish rose to
the surface, a short distance off our weather bow.

"Give way, boys! spring your oars," cried the captain; "another touch
or two with the lance, and that fish is ours."

The boat shot ahead, and we were about to dart a second harpoon into
the whale's side, when it took to "sounding",--which means, that it
went straight down, head foremost, into the depths of the sea. At that
moment Tom Lokins uttered a cry of mingled anger and disappointment.
We all turned round and saw our shipmate standing with the slack line
in his hand, and such an expression on his weather-beaten face, that I
could scarce help laughing. The harpoon had not been well fixed; it
had lost its hold, and the fish was now free!

"Gone!" exclaimed the captain with a groan.

I remember even yet the feeling of awful disappointment that came over
me when I understood that we had lost the fish after all our trouble!
I could almost have wept with bitter vexation. As for my comrades,
they sat staring at each other for some moments quite speechless.
Before we could recover from the state into which this misfortune had
thrown us, one of the men suddenly shouted, "Hallo! there's the mate's
boat in distress."

We turned at once, and, truly, there was no doubt of the truth of this,
for, about half a mile off, we beheld our first mate's boat tearing
over the sea like a small steamer. It was fast to a fish, and two oars
were set up on end to attract our attention.

When a whale is struck, it sometimes happens that the whole of the line
in a boat is run out. When this is about to occur, it becomes
necessary to hold on as much as can be done without running the boat
under the water, and an oar is set up on end to show that assistance is
required, either from th