The daily gazette., 1877-06-22
A Remarkable Story.

less during our lives, and on this evening
gathered before mine host Whitemarsh's
hospiiable and cheerful big open fire.
place, tales of adventure, by sea and
food, were made the order of the occasion.
Several rather tough yarns were spun. At
length Skipper Cummings Che had been
captain, cockswain, trapper and hunter,
seamen in ordinary and extraordinary,
and was now called " The Jldge'') told q
story of his experience, and declared
twas true, every word of it.u4D ...euu 5.
"It's a fact, gentlemen" he declared,
when he had wound up-"a solemn
fact. and if old Abe Green was livin',
be could swear TO every word of it," ''
,"Well," said another Charles OF the
company-Charles Sanborn IAN old
whaler, who had sailed around the globe
don't know how many times 81 can
tell you story that think will beat
that. Anyhow, 1t il true, from beginning
to end, and don't want no Abe Green
to swear to it, either, for / was there, and
saw it,-aye, saw it just exactly as tell
It," N
And with that Captain Senborn COM
fortably arranged his six-feet- -four-in7
ches of mortal bode, and told as fol-
lows: ,..4u.. 4a.. -
"We'd been up in the North Pacific
after whales, and had had good luck. 1t
was aboard the old ship Abe HoWtdnd,
of New Bedford, and was second mate.
On our way home just after leaving the
Sandwich Islands, the ship fever broke
out amongst US. You who've seen it
know what it is. 1t don't stop long to
hold parley with its victims, and as soon
as a man is dead you'd better chuck him
under water, for the contagi0n is dread
full. Well, the second man taken down
was our carpenter, a glorious good fellow
belonging to, Taunton, and one of the
best boat steerers ever saw. Ny eyes!
he could take a boat onto whale, and
off again after the iron was in, quicker'n
any man / ever saw. His, name was
Scott--Jack Scott-and his son Tom, a
boy OF twelve years, or thereabouts, was
with us,as cabin boy, u uI.I.st.i. H. ..l.,
"Well, Jack was taken down, and in
Two days he kicked the bucket. You
know how us with that fever when It
runs riot like that. 1t snakes 'em off
like a fit of the cholera jack slipped his
cable, as we all thought, just after noon,
and without much ceremony we sewed
his body up in a hammock, and to make
it sink quick, we hitched one of his own
old grind stones to the corpse, 1t was
stone pretty nearly worn out, tnat no.
body'd ever used but himself, aud we
thought it right proper to hitch it on and
let it go with him. Cap'n Selfdge read
the service, and then we let the dead slip
from the gang plank into the sea.
"We'd noticed that the boy Tom was
terribly taken down by the death of his
father, but, mercy! we never dreamed
how it took him. 1t just broke his heart
just took away his own care for life
and while the sound of the plash in the
water of the dead body and the grind
stone was yet in our ears, the boy gave
one cry of ageny--calling for his father
and over he went! clean overheard into
the water, right where the bubbles were
coming up from the sinking corpse.
You can imagine whether we had that
ship hove to, or not, and whether we had
a boat out. But 'twan't of no use. The
bow had sunk, and we couldn't find him.
"That evening, just after the cond
dog watch had been set, we saw q
shark in our wake. We knew he must
be wolloper from tse size OF his
black fin. which was out o'water half
the time. At first we thought we'd toD
the fellow alongside with sperm scraps
and put an iron into him, but Caprn
Selhdge wanted to try his big shark
hook; which he'd never used. He had
one that he'd had made on purpose
for him keen as cookbook and about
the size of derrick onk, with le lgtb
of two fathoms of chain I tn. Begin
ming of line. A piece of new three
quarter inch rope was made fast to the
ring of the chain, and the hook balted
with abig hunk of beef. AS told you
we had seen that the shark was a Whop
per-bigger'n we could haul in by
hand so We rugged whip and a stay
tack kie-0ne that we'd used for h'isting
in blubber--aDd then threw over the
baited hook from the lee main chains.
-whittaketl Did't shark lap for
i'll He saw it as it touched the water,
and he reached it just under our lee
quarter. The black fn settled-theb |
we saw. be white Of his enormous
belly as be rolled over to bile-Tsndl
then we had him. Whom we knew thai
he'd swallowed the b /, and that he