We paddled on into the interior of this vast cave, finding everywhere the walls rising sheer from the silent, dark waters, not a ledge or a crevice where one might gain foothold.  Indeed, in some places there was a considerable overhang from above, as if a great dome whose top was invisible sprang from some level below the water.  We pushed ahead until the tiny semicircle of light through which we had entered was only faintly visible; and then, finding there was nothing to be seen except what we were already witnessing, unless we cared to go on into the thick darkness, which extended apparently into the bowels of the mountain, we turned and started to go back.  Do what we would, we could not venture to break the solemn hush that surrounded us as if we were shut within the dome of some vast cathedral in the twilight, So we paddled noiselessly along for the exit, till suddenly an awful, inexplicable roar set all our hearts thumping fit to break our bosoms.  Really, the sensation was most painful, especially as we had not the faintest idea whence the noise came or what had produced it.  Again it filled that immense cave with its thunderous reverberations; but this time all the sting was taken out of it, as we caught sight of its author.  A goodly bull-humpback had found his way in after us, and the sound of his spout, exaggerated a thousand times in the confinement of that mighty cavern, had frightened us all so that we nearly lost our breath.  So far, so good; but, unlike the old nigger, though we were “doin’ blame well,” we did not “let blame well alone.”  The next spout that intruder gave, he was right alongside of us.  This was too much for the semi-savage instincts of my gallant harpooner, and before I had time to shout a caution he had plunged his weapon deep into old Blowhard’s broad back.

I should like to describe what followed, but, in the first place, I hardly know; and, in the next, even had I been cool and collected, my recollections would sound like the ravings of a fevered dream.  For of all the hideous uproars conceivable, that was, I should think, about the worst.  The big mammal seemed to have gone frantic with the pain of his wound, the surprise of the attack, and the hampering confinement in which he found himself.  His tremendous struggles caused such a commotion that our position could only be compared to that of men shooting Niagara in a cylinder at night.  How we kept afloat, I do not know.  Some one had the gumption to cut the line, so that by the radiation of the disturbance we presently found ourselves close to the wall, and trying to hold the boat in to it with our finger-tips.  Would he never be quiet? we thought, as the thrashing, banging, and splashing still went on with unfailing vigour.  At last, in, I suppose, one supreme effort to escape, he leaped clear of the water like a salmon.  There was a perceptible hush, during which we shrank together like unfledged chickens on a frosty night; then, in a never-to-be-forgotten crash that ought to have brought down the massy roof, that mountainous carcass fell.  The consequent violent upheaval of the water should have smashed the boat against the rocky walls, but that final catastrophe was mercifully spared us.  I suppose the rebound was sufficient to keep us a safe distance off.