or very small fishes--what, in that case, becomes of the history of
Jonah?"

"It is rather unfortunate," replied Becker, "that the whale has been
associated with this miracle. There is now no possibility of
separating the whale from Jonah, or Jonah from the whale; yet, in the
Greek translation of the Chaldean text, there is _Ketos_--in the
Latin, there is _Cete_--and both these words were understood by the
ancients to signify a fish of enormous size, but not the whale in
particular. The shark, for example, can swallow a man, and even a
horse, without mangling it."

"I have heard," said Jack, "of navigators who have landed on the back
of a whale, and walked about on it, supposing it a small island."

"There is nothing impossible about that," observed Willis.

"One thing is certain, that we had just now within reach a sea monster
who has carried off four leaden bullets in his body without seeming to
be in the least inconvenienced by them; on the contrary, he seemed to
move all the quicker for the dose."

"Life is a very different thing with those fellows than with us. The
carp is said to live two hundred years, and it is supposed that a
whale might live for ten centuries if the harpoon did not come in the
way to shorten the period."

"Ah!" exclaimed Willis, with a sigh that might have moved a train of
waggons, "these fellows have no cares."