has happened to me in my life, this is out o'
sight the wust. To think o' losin' that there whale, the very biggest I
ever saw--"

"Ah! Rokens, man," interrupted Glynn, as he pulled off his jacket, "the
loss is greater to me than to you, for that was my _first_ whale!"

"True, boy," replied the harpooner, in a tone of evidently genuine
sympathy; "I feel for ye. I knows how I should ha' taken on if it had
happened to me. But cheer up, lad; you know the old proverb, `There's
as good fish in the sea as ever came out o't.' You'll be the death o'
many sich yet, I'll bet my best iron."

"Sure, the wust of it all is, that we don't know who was the big thief
as got that fish away with him," said Phil Briant, with a rueful
countenance.

"Don't we, though!" cried Gurney, who had been in the mate's boat; "I
axed one o' the men o' the stranger's boats--for we run up close
alongside durin' the chase--and he told me as how she was the
_Termagant_ of New York; so we can be down on 'em yet, if we live long
enough."

"Humph!" observed Rokens; "and d'ye suppose he'd give ye the right
name?"

"He'd no reason to do otherwise. He didn't know of the dispute between
the other boats."

"There's truth in that," remarked Glynn, as he prepared to go on deck;
"but it may be a year or more before we foregather. No, I give up all
claim to my first fish from this date."

"All hands ahoy!" shouted the mate; "tumble up there! Reef topsails!
Look alive!"

The men ran hastily on deck, completing their buttoning and belting as
they went, and found that something very like a storm was brewing. As
yet the breeze was moderate, and the sea not very high, but the night
was pitchy dark, and a hot oppressive atmosphere boded no improvement in
the weather.

"Lay out there, some of you, and close reef the topsails," cried the
mate, as the men ran to their several posts.

The ship was running at the time under a comparatively small amount of
canvas; for, as their object was merely to cruise about in those seas in
search of whales, and they had no particular course to steer, it was
usual to run at night under easy sail, and sometimes to lay-to. It was
fortunate that such was the case on the present occasion; for it
happened that the storm which was about to burst on them came with
appalling suddenness and fury. The wind tore up the sea as if it had
been a mass of white feathers, and scattered it high in air. The
mizzen-topsail was blown