The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-12-08

WdCeT.
The squat died out and the clouds
lifted, but only to show me that night
was coming on apace, and in the twi-
light neither boat nor bark was visible.
In a little while the stars began to
come out and a feeling of utter lone
illness and abandonment possessed me
that 1 have never had equalied since.
The sea went down, and clinging to the
oar I drifted helplessly on the swell,
while my thought Were of a truly
agonizing character Some time during
the night, but at what hour I have no
idea, L suddenly became aware of the
approach of some object that came
nearer and nearer. 1t was long and
dark and rested low down in the water.
1t suggested an enormous ship S
boat, bottom UP. but 1 knew it
was not one. Was it some terrible
marine monster bearing down TO de-
YOUR me?
Nearer it came and nearer, rising
and falling gently on the swell of the
ocean, it's great bulk dimly outlined in
the dusky night. I struggled to get
out of it's way but was too exhausted,
and so with breath1ess anxiety, 1
awaited my fate.
A Strange Bark.
All at once my heart gave a leap of
joy and I am sure 1 shouted aloud.
1t was the carcass of dead whale,
floating on the water!
1 no longer feared it. I swan to-
wards it, seized upon it's enormous i'm
and, by a desperate effort, raised my
self and climbed upon it, drawing my
oar after me.
A harpoon, with a long section of
line attached, was sticking in the
% hon in IXyI1i
at once recognized the weapon which
Tom Dingley had hurled the night be-
fore. This was our prize, now dead
and af1at on the deep-a derelicti
I felt perfectly happy and fairly
danced for joy. I was saved. 1 had a
big raft, as it were, beneath me, and
could laugh at the treacherouS deep
about me.
It was a long night, but a strange
feeling Of content filed my soul; for
felt certain that the morning light
would reveal to me my companions.
and 1 should have the honor of bring
ing in the dead whale!
Morning dawned at last, and the sun
rose in an unclouded sky. I eagerly
scanned the ocean, but as my eye
swept from horizon to horizon it beheld
only an unbroken eXpanse of water,
with no ship or boat in sight. 1 was
Mortified and partially stupefied as the
awful truth burst upon me. L was
abandoned-alone on the mighty deep
-adrift on a whale.
I fell prone upon my face. groaned in
my despair, and for a moment was
tempted to throw myself into the sea
and end my misery.
After a while I began to recover my
reason little, and sat up, and spent
hours watching to see if a sail might
not rise on the horizon.
Eating Rare Whale Meat.
Toward noon, when my eyeballs
ached until they were ready to burst,
1 realized that I was dreadfully faint
and hungry. I drew my knife from its
sheath and cut a whole in the back Of
the whale and tried to eat some of the
raw flesh. 1t was far from palatable,
and l confess that L did not consume
a very large quantity.
About this time it occurred to me to
hoist a signal of distress; so l fastened
my handkerchief to the tip Of the oar,
and stuck the other end into the hole L
had cut in the whales back and so had
flag flying, which performance, after
1 had completed the job, struck me as
being rather silly when no ship or Nv
ing creature was in sight.
I was now getting a little used TO
the novelty of the situation, and soon
found myself specializing upon the
chances of an escape from the dread-
full position l was in.
There was some consolation in the
thought that a. storm was unlikely, Tor
there were no signs of bad weather.
Just how long my ship would float
could not tell, but 1 felt certain 1t
would be for days, perhaps weeks.
There would be privation, certainly,
but no starvation so long as any OF
the great fish should remain to be
eaten. And who could say the bark
might not heave in sight at any mo
ment? The idea of my ship lasting
until I could eat it up was so novel that
the conceit amused me vastly, and l
actually laughed aloud
About the middle of the afternoon I
tried again to satisfy my hunger on
slice of the whale, and succeeded better
than I did the first time.
A New Enemy.
Just before shutdown, however, L got
the biggest kind of scare. l heard
curious sounds proceeding apparently
from beneath the whale, and now ana
then 1 was sure I felt a tremulous mo-
ton as if the great carcass might be
scratching along the DOLIOm. Looking
over the side of the creature I was
Mortified to discover the fin of a shark
just breaking through the surface of
the water. Soon I saw other fins and
in "a few minutes I awoke to the fact
that they were attacking the carcass,
and actually tearing off strips of it's
tough skin. These brutes, these awful
of the sea, were eating up
my ship!
How long would my life-raft last
under the furious and hungry assaults
Of this rapaciouS horde?
There were already a dozen at work.
How soon might not this number be
swollen to a score, or fifty or may be a
hundred? My heart sank within me
and my mind refused to contemplate
the awful end that might be awaiting
me.
The sun set and night rested again
on the face of the great ocean.
The only sounds I heard were the
tapping Of the water along the sides
Of the whale, and that of the horrid
brutes around and beneath as they
tore off strips of flesh and snapped and
rr,tnchad tOoatF1er fheir T111ca ia us