Page:The land of enchantment (1907, Cassell).djvu/101

 separated the strands, found the innermost ones dry, and wrapped them round the match. Then I went to work on the harpoon, and wrestled with it, and lugged and tugged at it, until, just when I was a’most spent, I managed to get it out. Then I peeped into the hole which it had made, and, as I had hoped and expected, saw the sperm oil a-welling up.

“I now took my precious match, and yet was almost afraid to use it, for my life depended on my lighting that there oil! Ah, many’s the match I’ve wasted, Master Charles, and little guessed as I should come to such a pass as Id give the world, if I had it, for just one dry box of them! I dropped down on my marrow-bones, my heart a-beating like one o'clock, and, sheltering the match with my coat as well as I was able, prepared to strike. Suppose it should be blown out? Suppose it wouldn’t light at all? Hardly daring to breathe, with the greatest care I struck; the match burst into flame, and I lighted the oil, which flared up like a good ‘un. ‘Now, Benjamin,’ says I to myself, ‘you won't die just yet awhile of cold or hunger.’ I warmed myself at the blaze and dried my clothes, and then, taking my knife, I cut a nice steak from the carcase of the whale, and this I cooked at the fire, using the point of the harpoon as a toasting-fork. The meat was soon done to a turn, and then I fell to and ate it every bit, for after my exertions I felt pretty peckish, I can tell you.

“By this time ’twas night, and the third bird I'd killed with the one stone—I mean my beacon—blazed up finely. I’d now no fear of bears, or of being froze, so I laid me down where I was for forty winks. Just when I'd got to the thirty-ninth, as it seemed to me, and was dreaming that I was a whale and a-fishing for ships with a rod and line, I heard a hail: ‘Ahoy there, ahoy! Shipmate, what cheer?’

“Opening my eyes, I saw that it was day. I was surrounded by the simple Arctics in their dug-outs, who sat a-staring with all their eyes, as well they might, to see a leviathan of the deep a-burning his own private oil-lamp, and yonder—blessed sight!—was a boat, full of Jack Tars, a-pulling towards me, while a homeward bound ship lay in the offing. They had seen my signal of distress, and had come to rescue me. Yes, Master Charles, I was saved, and I think you'll be ready to admit what I told you when I began this here yarn, that I ain’t likely to forget in a hurry how I went a-fishing for my first whale.”