"Must be you made a mistake in addin' on 'em up. How long was that whale, now, on a guess?" "Well, I don't know; the Bajazet was a ship of three hundred and fifty tons, about the length of this one, I suppose; we brought the fluke-chain in at the _hawse hole_, and hauled it short up and down, and the mate had his cutting-stage over the stern to cut around the nib end; the head worked in under the counter sometimes and bothered him!" "And did ye's have much throuble to kill that chap?" asked Farrell. "None at all; laid like an island, you might have thrown a whole blacksmith's shop into him." "Do they often get whales as easily as we got this one to-day?" I inquired. "Yes, a great many are taken as easy as that. But not always, as you'll find out by and by; for there's all kinds of manoeuvres with whales, and hardly any two of 'em will act just alike." "Did you ever see any very bad ones taken?" I inquired. "Well--no--not very bad," returned the cooper, evasively; for, much as he felt disposed to draw the long bow on this sonorous string, he was by no means regardless of the interest of the voyage, and well knew the bad policy of telling frightful yarns to green hands concerning fighting whales. It would be time enough for that when they had acquired some experience, and seen a few ugly whales themselves. He was not to be drawn out on this subject. "Well, Cooper, how moosh you tink dis one he make?" inquired Manoel. "About ninety barrels." "Well, how moosh my part?" "What's your lay?" "Hun'n forty." "Well, about two-thirds of a barrel." "I s'pose _you_ get 'bout two bar-r-r-eels. Diabo! you make too moosh mon-ee, Cooper." "Got half a dozen mouths to feed," returned the cooper. "But that's nothing to do with turning in; my pipe's out, and I guess I'll turn flukes, for the old man will have us all out at daylight, and there'll be no cats but what catch mice to-morrow." Following his example, the boys all dropped off to their bunks, till only the watch were left, and they were stretched round on the windlass, or wherever they could find quarters, for the deck was lumbered with casks, cutting-falls, hooks, toggils, and various gear necessary for securing the blubber from the whale. The weather continued fine through the night, and at the first peep of daylight Captain Upton was out and stirring. "Who's got the watch here? Call all hands out, and overboard hook! I want that head off before breakfast. Clap on there, the watch, and haul out this starboard guy a little more! Whose overboard is it?" "Mine, Sir!" answered Bunker, who was equipping himself in an old short-sleeved shirt, a relic of "last voyage," and an old pair of woollen drawers, preparatory to jumping over on the whale to put in the blubber-hook, a part of the boatsteerer's duty far more desirable within the tropics than in higher latitudes, and especially to be eschewed on a cold, rugged morning in the Arctic regions.