The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-10-21
ovvERHAULING AN OLD WEAL-
 FyR - .4 h.

 oVVERHAULING AN OLD WHAL- FIR. ..5s =.-=
 On the dry dock at East Providence is a whaling vessel, and on the whaling vessel is unique sailor. The latter's lies in the fact that, al- though he has been at sea with whaling vessels most of his long life, he has new CT had a narrow escape from being killed by monstrous cetacean. has never been an occupant of a boat which was overturned by a whales fuke or crushed like an eggshell between a whales jaws, and has never seen sea serpent. He Is Western Islander by birth, a whaler by profession, and at present the keeper aboard the bark Jo-7 sephine of New Bedford, which, dis mantled, is undergoing rehabilitation in. the dry dock.
 But, unique as the keeper is, he is not more interesting in this day and gene ration than the vessel herself, repre-. senting as she does the remnant of what was once an enormous business, Half @ century ago-or was 1t longer 1.-the harbor of Providence, as well as that of every other New England coast city of any size, was the home port of scores of sailing vessels whose business was to search the four quarters of the globe for whales. Romance and hard labor went hand in hand in the arduous pursuit. The foundations of many fortunes in vested to-day ashore with less hazard were laid in the oil which fleets of whal- CTS gathered in sub-Arctic regions or under the Southern Cross, and daring mariners swept the oceans for their prey until the whale seemed in danger. of extinction. It appeared as though there could be no bottom to the busi- ness, but one was reached, nevertheless, and to-day a dozen men engage in whaling where a hundred spent their strength in the task lifetime ago.
 The bark Josephine served as a. re- hinder to old timers around the Jdry dock where she Is laid up, that there has been revival of late in the whal- ing business, and set their tongues wag- ging reminiscently of the old days The Josephine halls from New Bedford, al though the legend on her stern would make it appear that Boston Is her home port. As a matter of fact, she is one of the fleet of eight or nine vessels owned by J. W. R. Wing & Co., the largest concern now in the whaling business. She is three hundred and eighty-four tons burthen, and was built at Bath a quarter of century ago, 9 stanch, strong ship, as she needed to be for the work she had in hand. On recent cruise to the South Atlantic, however, she began to leak, curtailing the length of her voyage and when, after her re- turn to New Bedford, she sank at her wharf, her owners concluded to make general repairs. Accordingly she was dismantled and lowed to, East Provi- dence, where for several days force of carpenters, painters and general utility men has been giving her the sort of a grooming which will put her in shape once more to travel forth after monsters of the deep. &
 As she lies in the dry dock a good idea is to be obtained of the lines on which whaling vessels are built. She is almost as different from the ordinary schooner bringing freight to Narragansett Bay as Reliance is from the ordinary eruis- ing sloop. The coal schooner and the lumber schooner are pretty well given over to deck, and are obviously built with a main eye to capacity, with little
 thought of speed, while the Josephine on the other hand, is not intended fol carrying such burdens as are piled ir coasting freighters, and a premium is placed on speed and seaworthiness She has the graceful curves of a swift
 boat, combined with the depth of hull and general massiveness of construc- ton which go with ability to stand UT against heavy weather, and 1t is saiG
 that with a wholesale breeze she car
 make her fifteen knots an hour without
 laboring too hard. ,.. ":# Her square rig was stripped off be fore the Josephine left New Bedford and since arriving here her light outer sheathing and the copper plating Whicf
 underlay it have been removed. Int l work of replacing these is now almos
 completed. It was at her prov that th'
 leak was sprung which caused her pre- | mature return to New Bedford from hel 1 last cruise. Copper sheathing, whil'
 the best thing shipbuilders know for th' l purpose, is nevertheless unsatisfactory ! not so much because of its cost as of it. susceptibility to the action of sea water l In building such vessels as the Jose
 phine, therefore, efforts are made t l protect the copper as competely as pos sible from water. In the Josephine'
 case, her sheathing was knocked off for
 ward, the salt water attacked the cop
 per, and her captain, as soon as h.
 found that the leak was gaining on him
 struck his swiftest gait for New Bed
 ford with only four hundred and lift.
 barrels of oil aboard. Soon after reach