Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/240

ship from England, a voyage of fifty-nine days. Its engines can make only about ten miles an hour, and its boilers require only eight tons of coal per twenty-four hours. There is a crew of ten men, including mate, engineer, gunner, and cook. In these ships, whales are not chased in small boats; when a whale is sighted, it is pursued by the ship, under full steam. At a distance of fifty or a hundred yards, a harpoon is fired into the whale from a good-sized cannon. There is a time fuse attached to the harpoon, and this explodes a bomb which should kill the whale. A chain is then attached to its tail, and the carcass is towed to the rendering works in Durban. When a harpoon is fastened in a whale, and the bomb does not explode properly, it sometimes makes a run, and pulls the ship as easily as it might pull a row-boat. In such a case, another harpoon is fired into it as soon as opportunity offers. Frequently the whale breaks the great rope which attaches the harpoon to the ship. The reader will probably understand that a two-inch rope is attached to the harpoon fired from the cannon, and if the harpoon hits fairly, the whale is hooked and handled as a fisherman handles a small fish with a light line. If the whale runs away, the rope is let out slowly, being kept just taut enough to prevent breaking. If the whale rushes toward the ship the rope is hauled in rapidly, with a steam winch, as a fisherman reels in his line. If the bomb explodes inside the whale, as intended, it is usually killed at once, but this does not always happen, and then a fight is necessary. At Durban, the whaling-ships usually go out at 4 o'clock every morning, and return after nightfall. The cap-