The Bottineau pioneer. (Bottineau, N.D.) 1885-1895, 1894-01-20

ship had succeeded in making fast to the
| whale with a hafpoon and the whale
was lashing the water n Cldklns
things lively for the L'lcretiA's BOAT:
Just then the Hunters lau1 Nm teamed
round the whale, giving him a good
leevay, and then rushing past MIN
fired two bombs into his vitals and es-
capped just in time to avoid q sweeping
blow from his powerful tall. Mr.. Al
drich adds:
1t is disappointing to see a whale FOR
most pictures represent him as stand
ing up like a buoy or posing with MS
, tail on the top Of the water. The real
| fact is that only the top of the head
| about the spout hole and a small piece
| Of the back are seen, and perhaps the
'fukes' or, in common English, the tail
! may take an occasional sweep In the
air. When as near as we were, SO n a
we could look down into the water up
on the creature, his great size De
partially comprehended.
1t seems to be the duty OF every man
in the boat when the whale Is struck
to yell at the top of his voice. ven
where there is dignity to be kept up a
certain amount of this has to be done.
In the midst Of the shouting was
heard the "boom," of the two bombs
and the whale rolled over dead without
a struggle. I staid aboard the Lucre-
tia that night to see the whale cut IN.
Cutting Up II Whale.
The cutting-in process. which is the
cutting up process, Is an interesting
| one. When the whale is killed he is
! brought alongside the ship. First a
! long chain is secured around the
"fukes," than another chain is secured
to one fin and it is with this second
chain that the whale is managed.
The carcass runs fore and aft and the
fin in front Of the gangway. With
sharp cutting spades u man cuts
through the blubber, circling around
the whale from the extremity Of the
mouth toward the tail, cork-screw like.
He cuts down to the lean. BY hauling
on the fin chain the areas rolls and
the "blanket piece of blubber tears
itself off, aided by the cutting spades.
When the whale is rolled a quarter
over one lip m uppermost. \
tackle is fastened to this, then it Is cut
off, hoisted ON deck and dropped into
the ''blubber-rOom," as the space be-
tween decks from the maincastle to
the forecastle is called. All hosting is
done by the windlass, and in most of
the vessels power comes from Il don
key engine. The blanket piece Is
started again and the whale rolled half
over. The throat is then uppermost.
This in turn is cut off and deposited in
the blubber-room; then the other lips
roll up and are removed. BY this time
the blanket piecs becomes unwieldy
in its length, so another hold Is secured
close down to the carcass (by hooking
on another tackle) and the strip OF
blubber, perhaps Is feet long and 6
feet wide, cut off and dropped into the
blubber-rOOm.
The most difficult part Of the whole
operation is now at hand, that is to cut
off the head or upper jaw which con-
tains all the whalebone. A false or
careless might destroy hundreds
of dollars worth of bone, or possibly
cause the loss of the whole head. A
chain is carefully drawn through 4 hole
cut between the scalp bone and the
tough blubber about the spout hole.
The backbone is chopped nearly
through near where the blanket piece
was started, then, by a jerk of the
tackle, the weight breaks the remainder
and the head is hauled on board.
Heads contain over six hundred slabs
of bone, and in a large whale the