The Cruise of the Cachalot | Page 4

mighty anxious to get away. Sailor Jack is always hankering for shore
when he is at sea, but when he is "outward bound"--that is, when his
money is all gone --he is like a cat in the rain there.
So as MY money was all gone, I was hungry for a ship; and when a
long, keen-looking man with a goat-like beard, and mouth stained with
dry tobacco-juice, hailed me one afternoon at the street- corner, I
answered very promptly, scenting a berth. "Lookin' fer a ship,
stranger?" said he. "Yes; do you want a hand?" said I, anxiously. He
made a funny little sound something like a pony's whinny, then
answered, "Wall, I should surmise that I want between fifty and sixty
hands, ef yew kin lay me onto 'em; but, kem along, every dreep's a drop,
an' yew seem likely enough." With that he turned and led the way until
we reached a building around which were gathered one of the most
nondescript crowds I had ever seen. There certainly did not appear to
be a sailor among them. Not so much by their rig, though that is not a

great deal to go by, but by their actions and speech. One thing they all
had in common, tobacco chewing but as nearly every male I met with
in America did that, it was not much to be noticed. I had hardly done
reckoning them up when two or three bustling men came out and
shepherded us all energetically into a long, low room, where some form
of agreement was read out to us. Sailors are naturally and usually
careless about the nature of the "articles" they sign, their chief anxiety
being to get to sea, and under somebody's charge. But had I been ever
so anxious to know what I was going to sign this time, I could not, for
the language might as well have been Chinese for all I understood of it.
However, I signed and passed on, engaged to go I knew not where, in
some ship I did not know even the name of, in which I was to receive I
did not know how much, or how little, for my labour, nor how long I
was going to be away. "What a young fool!" I hear somebody say. I
quite agree, but there were a good many more in that ship, as in most
ships that I have ever sailed in.
From the time we signed the articles, we were never left to ourselves.
Truculent-looking men accompanied us to our several boarding-houses,
paid our debts for us, finally bringing us by boat to a ship lying out in
the bay. As we passed under her stern, I read the name CACHALOT,
of New Bedford; but as soon as we ranged alongside, I realized that I
was booked for the sailor's horror--a cruise in a whaler. Badly as I
wanted to get to sea, I had not bargained for this, and would have run
some risks to get ashore again; but they took no chances, so we were all
soon aboard. Before going forward, I took a comprehensive glance
around, and saw that I was on board of a vessel belonging to a type
which has almost disappeared off the face of the waters. A more perfect
contrast to the trim-built English clipper-ships that I had been
accustomed to I could hardly imagine. She was one of a class
characterized by sailors as "built by the mile, and cut off in lengths as
you want 'em," bow and stern almost alike, masts standing straight as
broomsticks, and bowsprit soaring upwards at an angle of about
forty-five degrees. She was as old-fashioned in her rig as in her hull;
but I must not go into the technical differences between rigs, for fear of
making myself tedious. Right in the centre of the deck, occupying a
space of about ten feet by eight, was a square erection of brickwork,

upon which my wondering gaze rested longest, for I had not the
slightest idea what it could be. But I was rudely roused from my
meditations by the harsh voice of one of the officers, who shouted,
"Naow then, git below an' stow yer dunnage, 'n look lively up agin." I
took the broad hint, and shouldering my traps, hurried forward to the
fo'lk'sle, which was below deck. Tumbling down the steep ladder, I
entered the gloomy den which was to be for so long my home, finding
it fairly packed with my shipmates. A motley crowd they were. I had
been used in English ships to considerable variety of nationality; but
here were gathered, not only the representatives of five or six nations,
but 'long-shoremen of all kinds, half of whom had hardly ever set eyes
on