. He, however, did not utter a word of
blame. He only found fault with himself.

"I told you once, Jack," said he, "that I ought to have been a master,
had it not been for my own ignorance, instead of before the mast; and
having missed that, had I not continued too idle to learn, I might have
got a boatswain's warrant. I tell you this because, though you are no
longer a youngster, you have many years before you, I hope, and may
still get the learning which books alone can give you, and without which
you must ever remain before the mast."

I need not say that he made me promise to find him out on my return. I
shall never forget the kindly, fatherly glance the old man gave me as he
looked down from the top of the coach which was to take him on his way
to the home he had so long left.

The _Drake_, ready for sea, had hauled out into the stream. She might
at once have been known as a South-Sea whaler by the height she was out
of the water, and by the boats which hung from their davits around her,
painted white, light though strongly-built, with their stems and sterns
sharp alike, and with a slight curve in their keels--each from about
twenty-six to nearly thirty feet in length. Although she had provisions
enough on board--casks of beef, and pork, and bread, (meaning biscuit),
and flour, and suet, and raisins, and rum, and lime-juice, and other
antiscorbutics--to last us for nearly four years, they were not
sufficient to bring her much down in the water, as she was built to
carry many hundred barrels of oil, which we hoped to collect before our
return. I may as well here describe the fittings of a whale-boat. In
the after-part is an upright rounded post, called the loggerhead, by
which to secure the end of the harpoon-line; and in the bows is a groove
through which it runs out. It is furnished with two lines, each of
which is coiled away in a tub ready for use. It has four harpoons;
three or more lances; several small flags, called "whifts," to stick
into the dead whale, by which it may be recognised at a distance when it
may be necessary to chase another; and two or more "drogues," four-sided
pieces of board to be attached to the end of the whale-line when it is
hove overboard, and which, being dragged with its surface against the
water, impedes the progress of the whale. Besides these things, each
boat is supplied with a case in which are stowed several necessary
articles, the most important being a lantern an