Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1882-07-21

Fayal is the rendezvous of the whalers from
the neighboring whaling grounds, and Cap
tain c. and his wife are much looked up
TO by the rest. He is a sun-burnt fellow, So
Der, silent and retiring; like all the rest in
the usual shore clothes of the sailor, blue
broadcloth suit and white waistcoat. His wife
is a fine specimen of smart Yankee woman.
In her shiny alpaca gown and stiff lace ruflle
at her throat, she is as trig as her own brig.
Her husband seems very proud of her, but is
himself OF gentler mien. Each defers pleas
antly to the other, and neither is self-assert-
ing. When Mrs c. was pressed by a
tourist to relate the story of how she saved
her husbands life with hot ,lates, she hesi-
tateG, but finally began the recital in sub
dued voice, with an admirable reserve and
dignity and solemn sense of the awful peril
through which her husband had passed. They
had captured a whale and got it alongside to
cut up. The jaws were unusually large, and
the captain himself was occupied in getting
the upper one, which contains the whalebone
of commerce, out from the head. As is usual,
an immense iron hook was inserted in the
lower jaw, attached to chains and blocks in
the rigging by which it was lifted. Within
the cavity of the mouth thus formed, on q
platform rigged over the ships side, directly
above the upper Jaw the captain stood hard
at work, carefully cutting out the thin plates
of whalebone from the upper jaw. His wife
came up from below, looked over the side at
her husbands position, and exclaimed, "Oh,
William, how dangerous that looks !" At
that instant the hook gave way, the horrible
jaw FELL crushing the staging to splinters,
shutting the captain within the awful cavern
of the mouth, and burying him under water
The cruel teeth penetrated the flesh of his
back, goring him terribly; but the waves
buoyed up the great jaw, and the captain,
with the most remarkable presence of mind,
feeling himself loosed, pushed his feet against
the ships side, and so kicked himself clear of
the whales mouth. He was picked up for
dead and lifted on deck. He made signs that
he was dying and that he did not wish to be
carried below. "But" said his wife, II want
a-gon' to give him up so l told the men to
carry him below; 1 stripped off his wet
clothes. His face was gashed and bleeding /;
he couldn't breathe; he gasped now and then ;
he was cold as death. told the steward to
heat all the plates there was on the ship and
I covered MIN with hot plates till began to
feel him growing warm. Then 1 poured
brandy into him. For five days and nights,
and man from forward watched and nursed
him. l wrapped him in poultices as big as a
sheet, and changed them every twenty min
utes TO take the soreness out of him and so
he lived"
Then after o moments pause, entirely ig-
noring her own grand part in the matter, the
captains wife added earnestly: "But he
couldn't have lived if he'd been a drinking
man. He'd always been strictly temperate
so, when he needed the brandy, it brought
him right up" 1t was the best temperance
| lecture l ever heard.
81 dunno about the brandy" said the cap
tain quietly. 'L guess brandy couldn't have
done much for me without my wife but, any
how, 1 hain't never meddled much with
whales jaw sence. From "a Summer IN
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