Meanwhile we had struck our whale. We approached him from behind. I heard the hoarse bellow of his spout getting nearer—he was the loudest spouter I ever heard; we passed his flukes, which worked slowly and lazily, for he had not seen us, and the sea made too much noise for him to hear us; then we passed his small and his hump. Then Mr. Brown nodded to the Prince, and he stood up, I suppose, although I saw nothing of him. Then Mr. Brown laid the boat around, and we ran spang into the whale’s body just aft of his fin, and the Prince darted both of his irons as Mr. Brown yelled to us, “Stern all!” The whale gave one convulsive leap ahead, his flukes went into the air, and came down again, drenching everybody in the boat, and he sounded instantly and rapidly. He took out line very fast, one tub and half of the other; then he turned, and came up again as fast as he went down. The line went out very nearly as fast when he was coming up as when he went down, but it was held on the loggerhead, so that it did not all go out. He breached a short distance from the boat, almost his whole length out, falling back with a great noise and a splash which filled us half full of water. [Illustration: A NANTUCKET SLEIGH-RIDE] Mr. Tilton, meanwhile, had been coming up as fast as he could, but he was not yet up with us. The whale obligingly lay still, looking about him with a malevolent eye, while we heaved in the slack of our line. We had it almost in when he caught sight of Mr. Tilton’s boat, and made for it instantly. Mr. Tilton withdrew a little, and the whale changed his mind and sounded again, but not deep. {311} The cows of the school had come up, and were hovering near, but not near enough for Mr. Tilton to get any of them easily, and he had his eye on our bull. The cows seemed to have lost their wits. They reminded me of a flock of hens crossing the road, and they were as hard to get. Our bull came up, and we managed to give Mr. Brown one chance with the lance. The thrust had not reached any vital spot, and that was all we could do, for the whale made up his mind to run.