AND SO--HOME
It was on October tenth that we broke out the Stars and Stripes at our
main gaff and squared our yards for home. Everybody cheered as the flag
went fluttering up, for everybody was glad that the end of the long, hard
voyage was in sight. Behring Straits which when we were about to enter the
Arctic Ocean--sea of tragedy and graveyard of so many brave men and tall
ships--had looked like the portals of inferno, now when we were homeward
bound seemed like the gateway to the Happy Isles.
The four whales we had captured on the voyage had averaged about 1,800
pounds of baleen, which that year was quoted at $6.50 a pound. We had
tried out all our whales except the last one and our casks were filled
with oil. Our entire catch was worth over $50,000. The officers and
boatsteerers made a pretty penny out of the voyage. The captain, I was
told, had shipped on a lay of one-sixth--and got it. The sailors had
shipped on the 190th lay--and didn't get it. That was the difference.
At San Francisco, the forecastle hands were paid off with the "big iron
dollar" of whaling tradition.
The homeward voyage was not a time of idleness. We were kept busy a large
part of the time cleaning the bone of our last three whales--the bone from
our first whale had been shipped to San Francisco from Unalaska. As we had
at first stowed it away, the baleen was in bunches of ten or a dozen slabs
held together at the roots by "white horse," which is the whaler name for
the gums of the whale. These bunches were now brought up on deck and each
slab of baleen was cut out of the gums separately and washed and scoured
with cocoanut rind procured for the purpose in the Hawaiian Islands. Then
the slabs were dried and polished until they shone like gun metal, tied
into bales, and stowed under hatches once more.
A little south of King's Island in the northern end of Behring Sea,
Captain Shorey set a course for Unimak Pass. We ran down Behring Sea with
a gale of wind sweeping us before it and great billows bearing us along.
When we bore up for the dangerous passage which had given us such a scare
in the spring, we were headed straight for it, and we went through into
the Pacific without pulling a rope. It was another remarkable example of
the navigating skill of whaling captains. We had aimed at Unimak Pass when
700 miles away and had scored a bull's-eye.
Again the "roaring forties" lived up to their name and buffeted us with
gale and storm. The first land we sighted after leaving the Fox Islands
was the wooded hills of northern California. I shall never forget how
beautiful those hills appeared and what a welcome they seemed to hold
out. They were my own country again, the United States--home. My eyes
grew misty as I gazed at them and I felt much as a small boy might feel
who, after long absence, sees his mother's arms open to him. The tug that
picked us up outside of Golden Gate at sundown one day seemed like a long
lost friend. It was long after darkness had fallen, that it towed us into
San Francisco harbor, past the darkly frowning Presidio and the twinkling
lights of Telegraph Hill, to an anchorage abreast the city, brilliantly
lighted and glowing like fairyland. I never in all my life heard sweeter
music than the rattle and clank of the anchor chain as the great anchor
plunged into the bay and sank to its grip in good American soil once more.
My whaling voyage was over. It was an adventure out of the ordinary, an
experience informing, interesting, health-giving, and perhaps worth while.
I have never regretted it. But I wouldn't do it again for ten thousand
dollars.
THE END
* * * * *
Transcriber Note
Hyphenation of boat-steerer vs. boatsteerer was not changed as there were
approximately equal number of each version. Other words were changed to
match the most used version. Minor typos were corrected. The illustrations
were moved to prevent splitting paragraphs.
End of Project Gutenberg's A Year with a Whaler, by Walter Noble Burns