Small difference it could make to the whale what got it! They were still keeping up the fight vigorously when a cooler breath came out of the southeast. It was only a puff, but soon there was another, which lasted longer; and before many minutes the breath of cooler air was steady, and growing stronger. We were just on the northern edge of the southeast trades, and had edged into them, or they had passed us, which amounted to the same thing. Captain Nelson had been edging to the southward for some days, with just that in view. We gathered way again, and when we had got near enough, Captain Nelson ordered Mr. Baker and Mr. Brown to lower. The order he gave, however, reduced Mr. Baker to a stupefied silence. “I don’t want you should hurt the whales,” he said quietly, as if it were the most natural thing in the world for a whaler not to want to hurt whales. “Drive off those sharks, and kill them if you can. I ’m going to try to keep those spouts in sight,” he went on, probably thinking that some explanation was necessary, or his mates might think he was losing his mind. “I ’m going to keep those spouts in sight, and see if they don’t lead us to something worth while.” And he turned away, muttering that it should be hereabouts if it was anywhere. We lowered, and pulled hard for the scene of combat. It was full time, for the cow was bitten and torn in many places, and could not have kept up the fight much longer. The larger whale—a bull, I thought—seemed {327} about ready to give it up, and take himself off. There were six of the big sharks, but one of them was so badly hurt by one of the whales that he could barely drag himself off, and all of them had been marked. The insensibility of sharks to pain or injury is an extraordinary thing. This one had been cut nearly in two, but he had kept up the fight, his viscera trailing behind him in a long festoon, until one of the others had relieved him of them. The other sharks did not molest him further, being too intent on getting the more delicate morsel, which we could see by the side of its mother. Nearly the whole of one side of its flukes had been bitten off, and it was somewhat torn in several places, although not seriously injured. We put the sharks to flight, killing three, after one of them, in his thrashings, had got his tail into the boat, and wiped me across the cheek. It was like a wipe with a rasp, or coarse sandpaper, and took the outer skin completely off my right cheek. It was a long time in healing, and I had to be at my duties for nearly a month, with half my head tied up as if I had the toothache.