indeed, it differs from it neither in taste, color,
nor density.

Pencroft had formerly served on board a whaling-ship, and he could
methodically direct the operation of cutting up, a sufficiently
disagreeable operation lasting three days, but from which the settlers
did not flinch, not even Gideon Spilett, who, as the sailor said, would
end by making a "real good castaway."

The blubber, cut in parallel slices of two feet and a half in thickness,
then divided into pieces which might weigh about a thousand pounds each,
was melted down in large earthen pots brought to the spot, for they did
not wish to taint the environs of Granite House, and in this fusion it
lost nearly a third of its weight.

But there was an immense quantity of it; the tongue alone yielded six
thousand pounds of oil, and the lower lip four thousand. Then, besides
the fat, which would insure for a long time a store of stearine and
glycerine, there were still the bones, for which a use could doubtless
be found, although there were neither umbrellas nor stays used at
Granite House. The upper part of the mouth of the cetacean was, indeed,
provided on both sides with eight hundred horny blades, very elastic,
of a fibrous texture, and fringed at the edge like great combs, at which
the teeth, six feet long, served to retain the thousands of animalculae,
little fish, and molluscs, on which the whale fed.

The operation finished, to the great satisfaction of the operators, the
remains of the animal were left to the birds, who would soon make every
vestige of it disappear, and their usual daily occupations were resumed
by the inmates of Granite House.

However, before returning to the dockyard, Cyrus Harding conceived
the idea of fabricating certain machines, which greatly excited the
curiosity of his companions. He took a dozen of the whale's bones, cut
them into six equal parts, and sharpened their ends.

"This machine is not my own invention, and it is frequently employed
by the Aleutian hunters in Russian America. You see these bones, my
friends; well, when it freezes, I will bend them, and then wet them
with water till they are entirely covered with ice, which will keep them
bent, and I will strew them on the snow, having previously covered them
with fat. Now, what will happen if a hungry animal swallows one of these
baits? Why, the heat of his stomach will melt the ice, and the bone,
springing straight, will pierce him with its sharp points."

"W