our labours! Those hungry monsters had
collected in thousands, and, to judge from what we were able to see of
the body, they had reduced its value alarmingly. However, we commenced
towing, and were getting along fairly well, when a long spur of reef to
leeward of us, over which the sea was breaking frightfully, seemed to be
stretching farther out to intercept us before we could get into smooth
water. The fact soon faced us that we were in the remorseless grip of a
current that set right over that reef, and against its steady stream all
our efforts were the merest triviality. Still, we hung on, struggling
desperately to keep what we had earned, until so close to the roaring,
foaming line of broken water, that one wave breaking farther out than
the rest very nearly swamped us all. One blow of an axe, one twirl of
the steer-oars, and with all the force we could muster we were pulling
away from the very jaws of death, leaving our whale to the hungry
crowds, who would make short work of him. Downcast indeed, at our bad
luck, we returned on board, disappointing the skipper very much with our
report. Like the true gentleman he was, though, recognizing that we had
done our best, he did not add to the trouble by cursing us all for a set
of useless trash, as his predecessor would have done; on the contrary, a
few minutes after the receipt of the bad news his face was as bright as
ever, his laugh as hearty as if there was no such thing as a misfortune
in the world.

And now I must come to what has been on my mind so long--a tragedy that,
in spite of all that had gone before, and of what came after, is the
most indelible of all the memories which cling round me of that eventful
time. Abner Cushing, the Vermonter had declared at different times that
he should never see his native Green Mountain again. Since the change
in our commander, however, he had been another man--always silent and
reserved, but brighter, happier, and with a manner so improved as to
make it hard to recognize him for the same awkward, ungainly slab of a
fellow that had bungled everything he put his hand to. Taking stock of
him quietly during our day-long leisurely cruises in the boat, I often
wondered whether his mind still kept its gloomy forebodings, and brooded
over his tragical life-history. I never dared to speak to him on the
subject, for fear of arousing what I hoped was growing too faint for
remembrance. But at times I saw him in the moonlit evenings sit