a regular sea running, and
one that was neither very high nor much broken. Still, the boats were
lifted on it like egg-shells or bubbles, the immense power of the ocean
raising the largest ships, groaning under their vast weight of ordnance,
as if they were feathers. In a few minutes, Gardiner and Daggett became a
little more separated, each looking eagerly for the spouts, which had not
been seen by either since quitting his vessel. All this time the two mates
came steadily on, until the whole of the little fleet of boats was, by
this time, not less than a marine league distant from the schooners. The
vessels themselves were working up to windward, to keep as near to the
boats as possible, making short tacks under reduced canvass; a shipkeeper,
the cook, steward, and one or two other hands, being all who were left on
board them.

We shall suppose that most of our readers are sufficiently acquainted with
the general character of that class of animals to which the whale belongs,
to know that all of the genus breathe the atmospheric air, which is as
necessary for life to them as it is to man himself. The only difference
in this respect is, that the whale can go longer without renewing his
respiration than all purely land-animals, though he must come up to
breathe at intervals, or die. It is the exhaling of the old stock of air,
when he brings the "blow-holes," as seamen call the outlets of his
respiratory organs, to the surface, that forces the water upward, and
forms the "spouts," which usually indicate to the whalers the position of
their game. The "spouts" vary in appearance, as has been mentioned, owing
to the number and situation of the orifices by which the exhausted air
escapes. No sooner is the vitiated air exhaled, than the lungs receive a
new supply; and the animal either remains near the surface, rolling about
and sporting amid the waves, or descends again, a short distance, in quest
of its food. This food, also, varies materially in the different species.
The right-whale is supposed to live on what may be termed marine insects,
or the molluscae of the ocean, which it is thought he obtains by running in
the parts of the sea where they most abound; arresting them by the hairy
fibres which grow on the laminae of bone that, in a measure, compose his
jaws, having no teeth. The spermaceti, however, is furnished with regular
grinders, which he knows very well how to use, and with which he often
crushes the boats of tho