Morning broke upon the stout ship still lying to under short canvas, the wind howling through the rigging, the decks drenched with spray, and everything cold and cheerless. The gale, however, now came in fitful gusts, with lulls between; in evidence that it had spent its force, and was breaking up. The morning watch were collected aft on the lee side of the deck, while Father Grafton, wrapped in pilotcloth, stood holding on by the weather quarter rail, and gazing at the sky to windward, observing the signs of better weather. As he turned and threw his glance casually off to leeward, a sudden lighting up of his countenance told that something had arrested his attention. He changed his position for a better view, and, in a moment more, spoke: "There it is again. Blo-o-ows! Sperm whale--there's white water! wounded whale, too--I know by the way he spouts. That must be the whale we struck yesterday--Blo-o-ows! Steward! tell Captain Upton there's a sperm whale off the lee-beam!" It was unnecessary to tell him, for he was just stepping out of the cabin at the moment. "Where away, Mr. Grafton?" Then, as his quick eye caught the smoke of the spout blowing off, "Ah! yes! I see him--there's white water. Yes, that's the whale that killed Mr. Johnson. O, if we only had good weather to pay him off for it!" Then looking to windward, "How _is_ the weather, anyhow? Can't we go down and have a dig at him? No, no, it's no use to put boats down into, this sea. By thunder! how he lies there, aggravating us! badly hurt, too; he can't go much. Got both irons in him, I expect--I couldn't tell about the second iron. Can't we keep the run of him till the weather moderates?" "I think we can," said the mate, "if he don't work to windward--and I don't think he will. He must have gone just about the drift of the ship through the night. We might kill him from the ship, but then we couldn't secure him afterwards, and we should drift to leeward of him." "I'd like to have the killing of him!" said the captain, eagerly. "I want a little revenge on that whale, and I would rather kill him than any other one in the ocean." Another impatient look to windward, "No, no, we can't use the boats. The-e-ere's white water again! We'll try him with the ship anyhow. Get some lances ready, and we'll run down there and have a fling at him--if we lose a lance or two it's no great matter--we'll have revenge at any rate. It's moderating every minute, eh, Mr. Grafton?" "Yes, sir; and there's the sun trying to break through the clouds yonder. I think we shall have good weather in an hour or two." "Yes, but it will take some time for the sea to go down. Get your lances ready! Here, Blacksmith, bend the end of that line to the lance warp. We mustn't check too short, Mr. Grafton, or we'll lose all our lances."