Chapter III
MANNING THE WOODEN WALLS OF OLD ENGLAND

One morning, soon after daybreak, as I was lying asleep in my
berth, I was awakened by a trampling on deck and loud shouts.
Aware that something unusual had occurred, I lost no time in
hastening to the scene of action. Ere I reached the deck, I
heard the word "porpoises" uttered in a loud key by one of the
sailors, which explained the cause of the excitement.

The mate, with sparkling eye and rigid features, in which
determination was strongly stamped, as if resolved "to do or
die," was busily engaged in fitting a line to the harpoon, which
had been sharpened and prepared for use some days before. I cast
my eye to windward, and saw the ocean alive with fish. Hundreds
of porpoises were swimming around the brig, crossing the bows, or
following in the wake, or leaping out of water and snuffing the
air, and racing with each other as if for a wager; passing so
rapidly through the liquid element that it wearied the eye to
follow them.

The mate was soon ready with the harpoon, and took his station on
the bowsprit, within six feet of the water. The line, one end of
which was fastened to the harpoon, was rove through a block
attached to the main-topmast stay; and the cook, one of the
sailors, and myself firmly grasped the rope, and stood ready,
whenever the word might be given, to bowse the unsuspecting and
deluded victim out of his native element and introduce him to the