It was nothing but a speck on the sea.

* * * * *

CHAPTER VIII.

THE JUBARTE.

Captain Hull, an experienced whaler, would leave nothing to chance.  The capture of a jubarte is a difficult thing.  No precaution ought to be neglected.  None was in this case.

And, first of all, Captain Hull sailed so as to come up to the whale on the leeward, so that no noise might disclose the boat’s approach.

Howik then steered the whale-boat, following the rather elongated curve of that reddish shoal, in the midst of which floated the jubarte.  They would thus turn the curve.

The boatswain, set over this work, was a seaman of great coolness, who inspired Captain Hull with every confidence.  He had not to fear either hesitation or distraction from Howik.

“Attention to the steering, Howik,” said Captain Hull.  “We are going to try to surprise the jubarte.  We will only show ourselves when we are near enough to harpoon it.”

“That is understood, sir,” replied the boatswain.

“I am going to follow the contour of these reddish waters, so as to keep to the leeward.”

“Good!” said Captain Hull.  “Boys, as little noise as possible in rowing.”

The oars, carefully muffled with straw, worked silently.  The boat, skilfully steered by the boatswain, had reached the large shoal of crustaceans.  The starboard oars still sank in the green and limpid water, while those to larboard, raising the reddish liquid, seemed to rain drops of blood.

“Wine and water!” said one of the sailors.

“Yes,” replied Captain Hull, “but water that we cannot drink, and wine that we cannot swallow.  Come, boys, let us not speak any more, and heave closer!”

The whale-boat, steered by the boatswain, glided noiselessly on the surface of those half-greased waters, as if it were floating on a bed of oil.

The jubarte did not budge, and did not seem to have yet perceived the boat, which described a circle around it.

Captain Hull, in making the circuit, necessarily went farther than the “Pilgrim,” which gradually grew smaller in the distance.  This rapidity with which objects diminish at sea has always an odd effect.  It seems as if we look at them shortened through the large end of a telescope.  This optical illusion evidently takes place because there are no points of comparison on these large spaces.  It was thus with the “Pilgrim,” which decreased to the eye and seemed already much more distant than she really was.

Half an hour after leaving her, Captain Hull and his companions found themselves exactly to the leeward of the whale, so that the latter occupied an intermediate point between the ship and the boat.

So the moment had come to approach, while making as little noise as possible.  It was not impossible for them to get beside the animal and harpoon it at good range, before its attention would be attracted.