cuttle-fish, is a horrid monster, all arms and beak, which the cachalot
considers a most dainty tidbit. Scientific sharks disagree as to the
exact process that forms ambergris, but they all agree that it comes
from an overindulgence in squid. Ambergris is very rarely obtained,
especially nowadays when the whaling industry is almost dead, and it is
actually worth double its weight in gold.

"It is used as a base in the manufacture of the finest perfumes. It is
the best perfume base obtainable--it has the virtue of making the odor
super-fine and enduring. The demand for it is insistent, and
unsatisfied--doubly insistent at the present time, for the supply of
the best substitute for ambergris, the sac of the Himalayan musk deer,
has also been steadily waning, and has now almost been dried up by the
European War. Today there is an almost unlimited market for ambergris,
and the lucky seller can command his own price. The stuff is precious.
We looked up prices in Frisco and found that forty dollars an ounce
will be paid without haggling.

"So now you know what ambergris is, and its connection with the perfume
industry. Soon you will see its connection with us. Meanwhile, let us
to John Winters's journal again.

"The next relevant entry is five days later, March 31st:

This day we picked up another piece of ambergrease, floating past
overside. Silva spotted it, and he gets ten pounds of tobacco as a
reward. It weighed ten pounds. The Old Man is very joyous; he says it
means good luck. This afternoon we raised two islands, well wooded.
Captain Peabody knows these islands. They are uninhabited, and the
north one is well watered. Tomorrow we wood and water.

"And then, comes the smashing denouement, the very next day, April 1,
1890:

This day there did happen to us the like which no whaleman aboard can
remember. I will write it down like it happened.

This morning, at dawn, we came through the channel into the lagoon of
the north island. It is a very difficult channel. A current sweeps
the shore and runs through it like it was a big funnel, and all the
driftage hereabouts comes into the lagoon. We let go anchor in ten
fathoms, a half mile from the beach.

I was given the wooding, and Costa was told off to water. We towed the
casks ashore, and landed on a fine, white beach, that was littered with
driftage. While the men were rolling the casks up to the spring
Captain Peabody told us about, Cost