ttacks and pierces the whale. The thrasher is a strong fish,
twenty feet long, and of great weight. Its method of attack is to leap
out of the water on the whale's back, and deal it a tremendous blow with
its powerful tail.

The swordfish and thrasher sometimes act together in the attack; the
first stabbing him below, and the second belabouring him above, while
the whale, unable, or too frightened, to fight, rushes through the
water, and even leaps its whole gigantic length into the air in its
endeavours to escape. When a whale thus leaps his whole length out of
the water, the sailors say he "breaches," and breaching is a common
practice. They seem to do it often for amusement as well as from
terror.

But the most deadly of the three enemies is the killer. This is itself
a kind of small whale, but it is wonderfully strong, swift, and bold.
When one of the killers gets into the middle, of a school of whales, the
frightened creatures are seen flying in all directions. His mode of
attack is to seize his big enemy by the jaw, and hold on until he is
exhausted and dies.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

TOM'S WISDOM--ANOTHER GREAT BATTLE.

One day I was standing beside the windlass, listening to the
conversation of five or six of the men, who were busy sharpening
harpoons and cutting-knives, or making all kinds of toys and things out
of whales' bones. We had just finished cutting-in and trying out our
third whale, and as it was not long since we reached the fishing-ground,
we were in high hopes of making a good thing of it that season; so that
every one was in good spirits, from the captain down to the youngest man
in the ship.

Tom Lokins was smoking his pipe, and Tom's pipe was an uncommonly black
one, for he smoked it very often. Moreover, Tom's pipe was uncommonly
short, so short that I always wondered how he escaped burning the end of
his nose. Indeed, some of the men said that the redness of the end of
Tom's nose was owing to its being baked like a brick by the heat of his
pipe. Tom took this pipe from his mouth, and while he was pushing down
the tobacco with the end of his little finger, he said--

"D'ye know, lads, I've been thinkin'--"

"No, have ye?" cried one of the men, interrupting him with a look of
pretended surprise. "Well now, I do think, messmates, that we should ax
the mate to make a note o' that in the log, for it's not often that Tom
Lokins takes to thinkin'."

There was a laugh at this, but To