As the equator neared, the daily lessons organized by Abner became more meaningful, and many mornings were spent, after the missionary waltz had ended, with group sessions discussing Wayland's Moral Philosophy or Alexander's Evidences of Christianity. Keoki Kanakoa also gave lectures on the condition of the islanders, but when he cried, "In Hawaii women are forbidden on pain of strangulation from eating bananas!" his point was somewhat dulled by Jerusha, who whispered loudly, "I count that no great privation." But the most solemn moment in any session came when someone, usually a woman, intoned the first line of their most cherished hymn: " 'Blest be the tie that binds'"; for at such times the mission family was indeed bound together in a Christian brotherhood that few discover in this world.
With the Pacific more placid and daily walks more congenial, seasickness vanished and constipation diminished, but a strange new illness began to take their place. At the beginning of the day women passengers would often suddenly feel an overwhelming nausea attack them, and they would have to vomit, just as if the ship were rolling in its former manner. It soon became apparent to Dr. Whipple that of the eleven wives aboard the Thetis, at least seven and possibly nine were pregnant, and he was proud when his own wife became the first to acknowledge openly that she was, as she phrased it, "expecting a small messenger from heaven." Her handsome husband perplexed the missionaries by remarking cryptically, "It's not surprising. I've known her since she was seven."
Jerusha's pregnancy was one of the latest to be certified, but it was also the one which was most enjoyed by the mother, for she was almost unmissionary in her delight. "It is a great solace to me, Abner," she said, "to think that I am going to become a mother in a new land. It's beautifully symbolic ... as if we were destined to accomplish great things in Hawaii." Abner, like the other husbands, was bewildered, for like them he knew practically nothing about having babies; and then a frightening discovery was made: of the eleven women aboard the Thetis not one had ever had a child, nor had any ever attended a birth. Neither had the men, excepting Dr. Whipple, and he suddenly became a most important man, breaking out his Practical Handbook of Midwifery, which everyone studied with care; and it was then that the first substantial shadow fell across the mission family, for women began to realize that when they reached Hawaii, Dr. Whipple would be assigned to one island and they would go to another, and when their time came, the mission's only doctor would be inaccessible, and birth would be riven under primitive conditions with only such help as a wife's husband could muster. It was then that wives looked at their husbands with greater affection, knowing that upon these men depended the family safety; and in this way the cabin of the Thetis became a kind of obstetrical seminar, with Brother Whipple as instructor and his medical books as texts.
It was early one Sunday morning that the missionaries heard the first mate cry, "Whaler to starboard!" Jerusha and Amanda, experiencing morning dizziness, did not go on deck, but the other wives did and saw looming out of the morning mists a magnificent three-masted ship, all sails set and riding the waves majestically like a queen. Smoke from the ofl pots had darkened her sails, proving her to be a whaler, and now one of her whaleboats was approaching the Thetis.
"What ship are you?" Mister Collins hailed.
"Bark Carthaginian, Captain Hoxworth, out of New Bedford. And you?"
"Brig Thetis, Captain Janders, out of Boston."
"We bring you mail to carry back to Hawaii," the whaler's mate explained, as he climbed deftly aboard. "And we'll take yours to New Bedford." Then, seeing the missionaries in their tall hats, he asked, "Are these men ministers?"
"Missionaries, for Hawaii," Captain Janders replied.
The whaler hesitated momentarily, then nodded deferentially and asked, "Would one or two of you come aboard and conduct Sabbath services for us. We haven't had any for months . . . really it would be years. We'll be home soon, and we'd like to remind ourselves .. ."
Abner, recalling his good work aboard the earlier whaler at the Falklands, quickly volunteered, and so did John Whipple, but principally because he wanted to see one of New England's great whaling ships at close hand. They were lowered into the whaleboat and started off, whereupon Abner as an afterthought shouted, "Tell our wives we'll be back after service."
At the Carthaginian the young missionaries were greeted handsomely. A tall, wiry, powerful man with a whaler's cap far back on his head shot out a big hand and cried in a deep, commanding voice. "I'm Rafer Hoxworth, out of New Bedford, and I'm mighty glad to see you good men coming aboard. We could use some prayers on this bark."
"Have you had a good trip?" Whipple asked.
"Whales are scarce," Hoxworth replied, cocking a long leg on the railing. "Our capacity is thirty-two hundred barrels, but we have only twenty-six hundred. Rather disappointing." Then he added, "But of course, we've already shipped twenty-two hundred barrels on ahead, so I don't think the owners will be unhappy." "Have you been away from New Bedford long?" "Coming four years," Hoxworth replied, rubbing his powerful chin. "That's a long time ... a very long time."
"But the oil you have, plus what you sent home . . . does make it a good trip?" Whipple pursued.
"Oh, yes! Good enough so that our share will permit several of us to get married."
"Including you?" Whipple asked.
"Yes."
"Congratulations, Captain Hoxworth. Abner!" and he called his sallow-faced companion, who was already arguing salvation and temperance with some of the crew. "Abner! Captain Hoxworth's going to get married when he gets home."
The scrawny little missionary with the pale stringy hair looked up at the rugged whaler and said, "And after four years of doing whatever he wanted to in Honolulu, he now hopes to get back into Christian ways, and asks our assistance."
The big captain tensed his right fist and pressed his foot strongly into the railing, but kept his temper. To himself he muttered, "By God! These missionaries are all alike. All over the world. You try to meet them halfway . . ." And John Whipple thought: "Why can't Abner just accept the day's events as they transpire? If a whaler heading home desires a Sabbath service, why can't we simply have the service?"
Then Whipple heard Captain Hoxworth's booming voice break into laughter. "Yes, Reverend . . . What was the name? Hale? Yes, Reverend Hale, you're right. Us whalers hang our conscience on Cape Horn when we head west, and then pick 'em up three years later when we come back home. We'd kind of like to have you ready us up for the job of catching 'em as we glide past."
"Do you glide past Cape Horn?" Abner asked in some confusion.
"Certainly." "How long did it take you to double Cape Horn coming out? Abner continued.
"What was it?" Hoxworth asked one of the men, a scowling, evil-looking rascal with a long scar across his cheek. "Oh, you weren't with us. We picked that one up in Honolulu when our cooper jumped ship. You, Anderson! How long did it take us to double the Cape coming out?"
"Three days."
Abner gasped. "You mean you got around Cape Horn in three days?"
"It was like glass," Captain Hoxworth boomed. "And it'll like glass for us when we go home. We run a lucky ship."
"That's the truth!" Anderson laughed. "If there's whales, we get 'em."
Abner stood perplexed in the sunlight, trying to rationalize the fact that an obscene whaler--for he was convinced that this was a hell ship--could double the Cape in three days whereas it had taken a group of missionaries almost eight weeks, and he concluded to himself, "The mysterious ways of the Lord with His appointed are beyond understanding."
"We'll pray aft," Captain Hoxworth announced, leading his men and the missionaries to an afterdeck that seemed as spacious as a village common compared to the cramped Thetis.
Abner whispered to Whipple, "You lead the singing and the prayers, and I'll give the sermon I gave on the other whaler," but just as the crew began singing, "Another six days' work is done," the lookout bellowed, "Thar she blows!” and the assembly disintegrated, some rushing for the whaleboat
s, some for glasses and some up the lower rigging.
Captain Hoxworth's deep-set eyes glistened as he spotted the blowing whales off beyond the Thetis, and he strode past the missionaries. "Get those boats away swiftly!" he boomed.
"Captain! Captain!" Abner protested. "We're having hymns!"
"Hymns hell!" Hoxworth shouted. "Them's whales!" Grabbing a horn, he shouted directions that sent the whaleboats far out to sea and watched with his glass as they closed in upon the mammoth sperm whales that were moving along in a colony of gigantic forms.
At this point John Whipple faced a major decision. He knew, for he was a missionary like Abner, that since this was the Sabbath he was bound not to participate in this desecration of catching whales; but he also knew as a scientist that he might never again have a chance of watching a crew fight a great sperm whale, so after a moment's indecision he handed Abner his tall hat and said, "I'm going up into the rigging." Abner protested, but in vain, and during the ensuing seven exciting hours, he stood glumly aft and refused steadfastly to look at the whaling operations.
Brother Whipple from his vantage point in the rigging saw the three whaleboats from the Carthaginian, each with sail aloft, a harpooner, a helmsman and four rowers, sweep down upon the massive whales.
"They're sparm!" Captain Hoxworth exulted. "Look at 'em!" and he passed Whipple a telescope. In the glass John spied the enormous beasts, wallowing in the sea and spouting a mixture of water and compressed air more than fifteen feet into the air.
"How many whales are there out there?" Whipple asked.
"Thirty?" Hoxworth suggested cautiously.
"How many will you try to take?"
"We'll be lucky if we get one. Sparm's smart whales."
Whipple watched the lead boat try to sneak up on a particularly large monster, but it moved aggravatingly off, so the mate directed his whaleboat onto a substitute, a huge gray-blue sperm that lazed along in the sun. Creeping up to it from the rear and on the right side, the mate maneuvered his prow deftly into the whale's long flank, and the harpooner, poised with left leg extended securely into the bottom of the boat, right cocked precariously against the gunwales, drew the harpoon back in his left hand and then flashed it with incredible might deep into the whale's resistant body.
At this first agonizing moment the great beast flipped out of the water, the harpoon lines trailing, and Whipple cried, "It's bigger than the Thetis!" For the men of the Carthaginian had hooked into a mammoth whale.
"It'll make eighty barrels!" a seaman cried.
"If we take him," Hoxworth cautioned. Grabbing the glass from Whipple, he watched the manner in which the whale plunged in its first attempt to shake off tormentors. "He's sounded," the captain reported ominously, waiting to see how the first mad dash of the monster would be handled by the crew.
Whipple could see the rope whirring out of the harpooner's tub, with a sailor poised ready with an ax to chop it free--thus losing the whale if trouble developed--and it seemed as if the leviathan must be probing the very bottom of the ocean, so much rope went out. The minutes passed, and there was no sign of the whale. The other two boats placed themselves out of the way, yet ready to assist if the whale surfaced near them.
Then, in an unexpected quarter, and not far from the Carthaginian, the whale surfaced. It came roaring up through the waves, twisted, turned, flapped its great flukes, then blew. A tower of red blood spurted high into the air, a monument of bubbling death, and poised there for a moment in the sunlight as if it were a pillar of red marble, falling back at last into the sea to make the waves crimson. Four more times the huge beast spouted its lungs' burden of blood. Hoxworth, noting the color, shouted, "He's well struck!"
Now came the most tense moment of the fight, for the anguished whale hesitated, and all knew that if it came out of this pause in the wrong direction it might stove the whaleboats, or crush them in its powerful underslung jaw, or even crash headfirst into the Carthaginian herself, sinking her within minutes, in the way many whalers had been lost. This time the whale ran true, and at a speed of thirty miles an hour, rushed through the open ocean, dragging the whaleboat along behind. Now the sail was furled and the four rowers sat with their oars aloft, while their mates aboard the Carthaginian shouted, "There goes the Nantucket sleigh ride!"
In this way six men in a little rowboat fought an enormous whale to death. The beast dived and paused, spouted blood and dived again. It ran for the open sea, and doubled back, but the harpoon worked deeper into its flank, and the rope remained taut. When the whale moved close to the boat, the oarsmen worked feverishly hauling in rope; but when the beast fled, they played it out again; and in this wild red game of take in and play out, the whale began to sense that it would be the loser.
Now a second whaleboat crept in, and its harpooner launched another cruel shaft of iron deep into the whale's forward quarter, and the chase was on again, this time with two whaleboats on the sleigh ride. Swiftly, they were hauled through the bloody sea, and swiftly their ropes were brought close in when the whale rested. Back and forth, up and down the leviathan fought, blood choking his lungs and beginning to paralyze his flukes.
"He's a monster, that one!" Captain Hoxworth said approvingly. 'Pray God he doesn't catch one of the boats."
The minutes passed and then the quarter hours, and the whale fought on, bleeding profusely and seeking the safer depths; but always he had to surface, a great bull sperm whale in agony, until finally, after a last mighty surge through the red waves, he rolled over and was dead.
"Got him!" Captain Hoxworth shouted, as the third whaleboat moved in to attach its line to the second, and in this manner the three crews slowly began to tow the whale back to their mother ship. The Carthaginian, meanwhile, manipulated its sails so that it could move with equal caution toward the oncoming whale.
Aboard ship there was much activity. Along the starboard side a section of railing was lifted away, and a small platform was lowered six or eight feet above the surface of the sea. Men brought out razor-sharp blubber knives with twenty-foot handles. Others laboriously lugged huge iron hooks, each weighing almost as much as a man, into position for biting into the blubber and pulling it aboard. Where Abner was to have preached, the cook and his helper piled dry wood for firing the try-pots in which the whale oil would be rendered, while forward the scar-faced cooper supervised the opening of the hatch and the airing of barrels into which that blubber would be stowed that could not be immediately cooked. Just as these preparations were completed, with John Whipple noting each step in the process, and Abner Hale trying not to do so because all was being done on a Sunday, the whale was brought alongside and Whipple cried, "It's longer than the Thetis," but Captain Hoxworth, who like all whalers never referred to the length of a whale, growled, "He'll make eighty, ninety barrels. A monster."
When the great sperm was lashed to the starboard side of the Carthaginian, and when the frail platform was adjusted, a black Brava sailor, from the Cape Verdes, nimbly leaped onto the whale's body and with a slashing knife tried to cut at the blubber so as to attach the giant hooks that were being lowered to him. Deft as he was, he could not make the enormous hooks fast, and when the Carthaginian took a sudden shift to windward, the Brava was struck in the chest by one of the swaying hooks and swept off the whale's flank and intp the ocean, whereupon a dozen sleek sharks who had been following the blood stormed down upon him, but the men on the platform slashed and cut at the raiders and drove ithem off, so that the Brava climbed back on the whale, cursing in Portuguese, and this time, dripping in blood from whale and shark alike, he caught the brutal hooks into the blubber, and the unwinding was ready to begin. But before it could start, the whale's great head--twenty-six feet long and weighing tons--had to be cut away and fastened to the after end of the ship.
"You, Brava!” Captain Hoxworth shouted. "Tie this hook into the head!" And the sinewy black man leaped nimbly onto the whale's head, securing the hook, after which his mates with extra sharp knives on long
poles sawed away the mammoth head.
When it drifted clear, they directed their knives to the body of the whale, slashing the thick blubbery skin in sloping spirals that started from where the head had been and ran down to the huge tail hanging limp in the sea. As the skilled workmen cut, they frequently paused for sport and slashed their deadly knives deep into some shark that had come to feed upon the carcass, and when the knife was withdrawn the shark would twist slightly, as if a bee had stung him, and continue feeding.
Now the men on the lines leading to heavy hooks began to haul, and slowly the whale rolled over and over upon itself while the blanket or blubber unpeeled in a huge spiral and was hauled aloft, When more than a dozen feet hung over the deck, one iron hook was cut free from the top and hooked into position lower down. Then the other was cut away and fastened beside the first, allowing the end of blubber to fall free upon the deck, where it was cut away, hacked into pieces, and thrust at first into the boiling try-pots, and when they were full, into the temporary barrels. Then the lines were hauled tight once more, and the thick blanket of blubber continued to unwind and swing aboard, as men on the swaying platform cut it free from the body of the slowly revolving whale.
At last the tail was reached, and in the final moments, before the monstrous carcass was set free for the sharks, the Brava leaped back onto it and cut away a dozen steaks of fresh whale meat. "Get some liver, too," a sailor shouted, but the Brava felt himself slipping toward the sharks, so he grabbed a line and swung himself back aboard the platform. With a final slash of their scimitar-like knives, the workmen cut the whale loose and he drifted away to the waiting sharks.
Next the giant head was cut into three sections and hauled aboard, where near-naked men scooped out of its vast case more than two dozen precious barrels full of spermaceti, which would be converted into candles and cosmetics.
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