It was really a pleasant sight to see Abner receiving as if being invested with an order of merit, the twenty pounds of tobacco to which he was entitled.  Poor fellow! he felt as if at last he were going to be thought a little of, and treated a little better.  He brought his bounty forrard, and shared it out as far as it would go with the greatest delight and good nature possible.  Whatever he might have been thought of aft, certainly, for the time, he was a very important personage forrard; even the Portuguese, who were inclined to be jealous of what they considered an infringement of their rights, were mollified by the generosity shown.

After every sign of the operations had been cleared away, the jaw was brought out, and the teeth extracted with a small tackle.  They were set solidly into a hard white gum, which had to be cut away all around them before they would come out.  When cleaned of the gum, they were headed up in a small barrel of brine.  The great jaw-pans were sawn off, and placed at the disposal of anybody who wanted pieces of bone for “scrimshaw,” or carved work.  This is a very favourite pastime on board whalers, though, in ships such as ours, the crew have little opportunity for doing anything, hardly any leisure during daylight being allowed.  But our carpenter was a famous workman at “scrimshaw,” and he started half a dozen walking-sticks forthwith.  A favourite design is to carve the bone into the similitude of a rope, with “worming” of smaller line along its lays.  A handle is carved out of a whale’s tooth, and insets of baleen, silver, cocoa-tree, or ebony, give variety and finish.  The tools used are of the roughest.  Some old files, softened in the fire, and filed into grooves something like saw-teeth, are most used; but old knives, sail-needles, and chisels are pressed into service.  The work turned out would, in many cases, take a very high place in an exhibition of turnery, though never a lathe was near it.  Of course, a long time is taken over it, especially the polishing, which is done with oil and whiting, if it can be got—­powdered pumice if it cannot.  I once had an elaborate pastry-cutter carved out of six whale’s teeth, which I purchased for a pound of tobacco from a seaman of the coral whaler, and afterwards sold in Dunedin, New Zealand, for L2 10s., the purchaser being decidedly of opinion that he had a bargain.

*

CHAPTER IX

OUR FIRST CALLING-PLACE

Perhaps it may hastily be assumed, from the large space already devoted to fishing operations of various kinds, that the subject will not bear much more dealing with, if my story is to avoid being monotonous.  But I beg to assure you, dear reader, that while of course I have most to say in connection with the business of the voyage, nothing is farther from my plan than to neglect the very interesting portion of our cruise which relates to visiting strange, out-of-the-way