The morning news., 1894-10-21
MODERN WHALING.
Recent Inventions Give the Leviathen
no Chance and Jack no Fun.
From the San Francisco Examiner.

From the San Francisco Examiner.
The first two vessels from the whaling
fleet in the Arctic ocean arrived in port
during the past week, and with them
came the oft-told stories Of the danger
and death of those who sail into the frozen
north in search of gain and find only
graves. The crew of one of the vessels,
the Nicolini, spent nearly three years
among the snow and ice north of S.
as Kipling calls it.
Whaling is not what it used to be-"
said a grizzly old salt as he sat on the
edge of his greasy bunk in the forecastle.
THE hips that go after 'bowheads' now
adays are much better arranged for the
comfort of the men than they were a
dozen years ago, but 1t amt no picnic
yet; you can bet on that, my son, you can
bet on that"
About all that remains of the old Gus
toms of the whalers is the lookout at the
masthead, who brings every man out of
his warm bunk with the call ''Ya-a-ar!
She blows" and with wave of his hand
points out the direction for the wheels
man to steer. The crews jump into their
boats and away they go. The old har-
poon is obsolete. Instead a whale-gun is
used, and as the boat approaches the
spouting monster, a bomb, filled with an
explosive equal to about ten pounds of
giant powder, is fired into his huge body
near the head. The deadly missile ex-
plodes as it buries itself into the flesh
and a great hole is blown almost into the
vitals Of the monster. Death is in most
cases instantaneous. A small steam or
naphtha launch takes the carcass in tow,
and it is hauled alongside of the vessel,
where the bone and blubber are taken
from it.
Sometimes if he bomb from the gun falls
to cause instant death or give a mortal
wound, a harpoon with a dynamite at
tacnment is thrown the same as the old
whale-catching weapons were; and, as the
needle point of the spear sinks into the
flesh it explodes the bomb. The second
wound win in almost every case cause
death, but if not, the haTDoon clngs to
the whale, and with the line attached the
whalers wait calmly in their boat for the
cetacean to rise for another shot at it
from the gun, which is by that time re-
loaded and waiting for it, There is none
of that wild excitement of being towed
at race horse speed through the water be-
hind wounded and infuriated whale,
while your comrades come gallantly to
the rescue to pick you up in case the boat
be smashed to atoms by the beasts tail
or crushed in the monstrous jaws of the
madden leviathan. All that is gone. The
ships boats surround the whale as he
spouts. Little chance is left for it to
escape, and a bomb from a gun or the
auxiliary harpoon is sufficient to end the
battle.
Then comes the process of taking the
bone and blubber from the body. The
dead whale is brought alongside of the
vessel. A stage is rugged over the side
and just over the floating carcass. Work
is commenced at the head A cut is made
through the deep layer of fat, beginning
at the nose and running clear back to the
tail, if all the blubber is to be taken. Gross
| incisions are made every four or five
feet and the strips of the fat encircling
the whale m a rypd fz foe
tened to one end of these strips, and men
on the stage with long chiseI-like
tools cut the strip of blubber clear of the
! body as it is being hoisted on board. Ev-
cry strip taken off rolls the whale around
in the water. The head is cut off as soon
as the blubber is taken off it to get at the
valuable bone. That is the most difficult
task Axes are used, and it takes quite
lot of chopping to get through the noun
tain of flesh. AS soon as it is severed it
is hoisted on deck. Then the work goes
on of taking off the rest of the fat from
the body.
Some of the vessels save only the bone,
and when the head is chopped off the rest
of the body is cast adrift. The whalers
that take only the heads are usually small
ones, and are fitted with the necessary
| apparatus for trying out the oil.
After the blubber is all stripped from the
! carcass it is cut up into small pieces, and
! for several days afterward the crew is
busy trying out the oil and slowing it
away in the hold in casks Smoke and
| smell are the principal characteristics of
the operation and only an old whaler
will so to leeward of the great pots when
/ the process is going on.
During the hunt for whales there is very
! little to break the monotony of the whal-
/ er's life. 1t is the same thing day after
| day. with an occasional gale and trip
| in the ice, but the vessels are now built TO
| stand such weather.
| A winter in the Arctic has not the ter
| rors 1t had few years ago. Quarters for
| the crew are built on the land in some
! sheltered spot, and before the winter sets
! in all the vessels rendezvous there The
| tween decks of the vessels are cleared
| and stoves are set up. Bunks are ar
! ranged along the middle of the ships
! away from the sides, 50 that the intense
| cold will not so quickly reach the men
/ through the vessels tlmbers and as soon
] as the ice forms around the vessels high
/ banks of snow are piled up around them
/ to break the force of the piercing winds
/ A roof is built over the ships, and on that
/ snow is piled several feet thick, and II all
/ is wet and frozen so solid that it will
/ not drift with the flercest of gales that
/ sweep across the frozen bosom of the
! ocean when that long night of winter sets