the whale,
for it was loosely coiled in a space for the purpose in the
boat's bow, to the extent of two hundred feet, and this was 20
cast overboard by the harpooner as soon as the fish was
fast.

He made a fearful to-do over it, rolling completely over
several times, backward and forward, at the same time
smiting the sea with his mighty tail, making an almost 25
deafening noise and pother. But we were comfortable
enough while we unshipped the mast and made ready for
action, being sufficiently far away from him to escape the
full effect of his gambols.

After the usual time spent in furious attempts to free 30
himself from our annoyance, he betook himself below, leaving
us to await his return and hasten it as much as possible
by keeping a severe strain upon the line. Our efforts in
this direction, however, did not seem to have any effect
upon him at all. Flake after flake ran out of the tubs until
we were compelled to hand the end of our line to the second
mate, to splice his own on to. Still it slipped away, and 5
at last it was handed to the third mate, whose two tubs
met the same fate. It was now Mistah Jones's turn to
"bend on," which he did with many chuckles, as of a man
who was the last resource of the unfortunate. But his
face grew longer and longer as the never-resting line continued 10
to disappear. Soon he signaled us that he was
nearly out of line, and two or three minutes after, he bent
on his "drogue" (a square piece of plank with a rope tail
spliced into its center, and considered to hinder a whale's
progress at least as much as four boats) and let go the end. 15
We had each bent on our drogues in the same way, when
we passed our ends to one another. So now our friend was
getting along somewhere below, with 7200 feet of one-and-a-half-inch
rope, and weight additional equal to the
drag of sixteen thirty-foot boats. 20

Of course we knew that unless he were dead and sinking
he could not possibly remain much longer beneath the
surface. The exhibition of endurance we had just been
favored with was a very unusual one, I was told, it being a
rare thing for a cachalot to take out two boats' lines before 25
returning to the surface to spout.

Therefore we separated as widely as was thought necessary,
in order to be near him on h