men who separate the
oily part from it are called "krangers." The "kings" throw the blubber
in rough out of the "flense gut" to the "krangers" on deck; from them it
is passed to the harpooners, who are the skinners. After the skin has
been sliced off, it is placed on the chopping-block, before which stand
in a row the boat-steerers, who with their long knives cut it up into
oblong pieces not larger than four inches in diameter, and then push it
into the speck-trough.

The line-managers are stationed in the hold, and guide the tube or lull
to the casks they desire to fill. Finally, when no more can fall in,
piece after piece is jambed in by a pricker, and the cask is bunged up.
Sometimes not only are all the casks on board filled, but the blubber is
stowed away in bulk in the hold, and even between decks; but this good
fortune does not often occur.

It will be seen by any one who has read an account, that the process of
preparing the cargo by the whalers in the southern seas is very
different. Andrew Thompson had once been in a South Sea whaler, and he
told me he never wished to go in another; for a wilder, more mutinous
set of fellows it was never his ill-luck, before or since, to meet.
This was, of course, owing partly to the captain, who was a rough,
uncultivated savage, and totally unfit to gain any moral restraint over
his men.

"I'll tell you what it is, Peter," said Andrew, as I sat by him in the
forecastle that evening, listening to his yarns, "till the masters are
properly educated, and know how to behave like officers and gentlemen,
the men will be mutinous and ill-conducted. When I say like gentlemen,
I don't mean that they should eat with silver forks off china, drink
claret, and use white pocket-handkerchiefs. Those things don't make the
gentleman afloat more than on shore. But what I like to see, is a man
who treats his crew with proper gentleness, who looks after their
interest in this world and the next, and tries to improve them to the
best of his power--who acts, indeed, as a true Christian will act--that
man is, I say, a gentleman. I say, put him where you will, ask him to
do what you will, he will look and act like a gentleman. Who would dare
to say that our good captain is not one? He looks like one, and acts
like one, at all times and occasions; and if we had many more like him
in the merchant service generally, we should soon have an improvement in
the condition of our seamen.

"But