Frank T. Bullen - The Cruise of the Cachalot. Round the World After Sperm Whales

Title: The Cruise of the Cachalot. Round the World After Sperm Whales

Author: Frank T. Bullen

CHAPTER I

OUTWARD BOUND

At the age of eighteen, after a sea-experience of six years from

the time when I dodged about London streets, a ragged Arab, with

wits sharpened by the constant fight for food, I found myself

roaming the streets of New Bedford, Massachusetts. How I came

to be there, of all places in the world, does not concern this

story at all, so I am not going to trouble my readers with it;

enough to say that I WAS there, and mighty anxious to get away.

Sailor Jack is always hankering for shore when he is at sea, but

when he is "outward bound"--that is, when his money is all gone

--he is like a cat in the rain there.

So as MY money was all gone, I was hungry for a ship; and when a

long, keen-looking man with a goat-like beard, and mouth stained

with dry tobacco-juice, hailed me one afternoon at the street-

corner, I answered very promptly, scenting a berth. "Lookin'

fer a ship, stranger?" said he. "Yes; do you want a hand?" said

I, anxiously. He made a funny little sound something like a

pony's whinny, then answered, "Wall, I should surmise that I

want between fifty and sixty hands, ef yew kin lay me onto 'em;

but, kem along, every dreep's a drop, an' yew seem likely

enough." With that he turned and led the way until we reached a

building around which were gathered one of the most nondescript

crowds I had ever seen. There certainly did not appear to be a

sailor among them. Not so much by their rig, though that is not

a great deal to go by, but by their actions and speech. One

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