"We must talk over that some other time, Buzzby. The captain loves
punctuality." So saying, the young surgeon sprang down the companion
ladder, leaving the old salt to smoke his pipe in solitude.

And here we may pause a few seconds to describe our ship and her crew.

The _Dolphin_ was a tight, new, barque-rigged vessel of about three
hundred tons burden, built expressly for the northern whale-fishery, and
carried a crew of forty-five men. Ships that have to battle with the ice
require to be much more powerfully built than those that sail in
unencumbered seas. The _Dolphin_ united strength with capacity and
buoyancy. The under part of her hull and sides were strengthened with
double timbers, and fortified externally with plates of iron, while,
internally, stanchions and crossbeams were so arranged as to cause
pressure on any part to be supported by the whole structure; and on her
bows, where shocks from the ice might be expected to be most frequent
and severe, extra planking, of immense strength and thickness, was
secured. In other respects, the vessel was fitted up much in the same
manner as ordinary merchantmen. The only other peculiarity about her
worthy of notice was the crow's-nest, a sort of barrel-shaped structure
fastened to the fore-mast-head, in which, when at the whaling-ground, a
man is stationed to look out for whales. The chief men in the ship were
Captain Guy, a vigorous, earnest, practical American; Mr. Bolton, the
first mate, a stout, burly, off-hand Englishman; and Mr. Saunders, the
second mate, a sedate, broad-shouldered, raw-boned Scot, whose opinion
of himself was unbounded, whose power of argument was extraordinary, not
to say exasperating, and who stood six feet three in his stockings.
Mivins, the steward, was, as we have already remarked, a tall, thin,
active young man, of a brisk, lively disposition, and was somewhat of a
butt among the men, but being in a position of power and trust, he was