length is then attached to the middle of this block, and the other end of the line being looped, it can in a moment be fastened to a harpoon. It is chiefly among gallied whales that this drugg is used. For then, more whales are close round you than you can possibly chase at one time. But sperm whales are not every day encountered; while you may, then, you must kill all you can. And if you cannot kill them all at once, you must wing them, so that they can be afterwards killed at your leisure. Hence it is, that at times like these the drugg comes into requisition. Our boat was furnished with three of them. The first and second were successfully darted, and we saw the whales staggeringly running off, fettered by the enormous sidelong resistance of the towing drugg. They were cramped like malefactors with the chain and ball. But upon flinging the third, in the act of tossing overboard the clumsy wooden block, it caught under one of the seats of the boat, and in an instant tore it out and carried it away, dropping the oarsman in the boat’s bottom as the seat slid from under him. On both sides the sea came in at the wounded planks, but we stuffed two or three drawers and shirts in, and so stopped the leaks for the time.
Había sido casi imposible disparar estos arpones envenenados, de no ser porque, a medida que avanzábamos hacia el interior de la manada, la marcha de nuestra ballena disminuyó considerablemente; además, porque a medida que nos alejábamos más y más de la circunferencia de la conmoción, los direchundos desórdenes parecían ir menguando. De modo que cuando al fin el arponazo a tirones se desprendió y la ballena remolcada desapareció de lado; entonces, con la fuerza decreciente de su ímpetu final, nos deslizamos entre dos ballenas hacia el corazón más recóndito del banco, como si desde algún torrente de montaña nos hubiéramos deslizado hasta el sereno lago de un valle.