propensities, mighty though they were, often proved harmless, when
opposed to the genius of man. But now, how changed! In our frail
boat, I would fain have built an altar to Neptune.

What a mere toy we were to the billows, that jeeringly shouldered
us from crest to crest, as from hand to hand lost souls may be tossed
along by the chain of shades which enfilade the route to Tartarus.

But drown or swim, here's overboard with care! Cheer up, Jarl! Ha!
Ha! how merrily, yet terribly, we sail! Up, up--slowly up--toiling up
the long, calm wave; then balanced on its summit a while, like a
plank on a rail; and down, we plunge headlong into the seething
abyss, till arrested, we glide upward again. And thus did we go. Now
buried in watery hollows--our sail idly flapping; then lifted aloft--
canvas bellying; and beholding the furthest horizon.

Had not our familiarity with the business of whaling divested our
craft's wild motions of its first novel horrors, we had been but a
rueful pair. But day-long pulls after whales, the ship left miles
astern; and entire dark nights passed moored to the monsters, killed
too late to be towed to the ship far to leeward:--all this, and much
more, accustoms one to strange things. Death, to be sure, has a mouth
as black as a wolf's, and to be thrust into his jaws is a serious
thing. But true it most certainly is--and I speak from no hearsay--
that to sailors, as a class, the grisly king seems not half so
hideous as he appears to those who have only regarded him on shore,
and at a deferential distance. Like many ugly mortals, his features
grow less frightful upon acquaintance; and met over often and
sociably, the old adage holds true, about familiarity breeding
contempt. Thus too with soldiers. Of the quaking recruit, three