Enoch is first, last, and all the time captain of a
whaler; he knows about whales and whale-hunters just as an engineer on
the road knows every speck of scenery along the line, every man, and
every engine. Enoch couldn't talk ten minutes without being "reminded"
of an incident in his whaling life; couldn't meet a whaleman without
"yarning" about the whale business. He lit his pipe and asked: "Been
whaling, or hunting the North Pole?"
"Well, both."
"What ship?"
"The 'Duncan McDonald.'"
"The--the 'McDonald!'--why, man, we counted her lost these five years;
tell me about her, quick. Old Chuck Burrows was a particular friend of
mine--where is he?"
"Captain, Father Burrows and the 'Duncan McDonald' have both gone over
the unknown ocean to the port of missing ships."
"Sunk?"
"Aye, and crushed to atoms in a frozen hell."
Enoch looked out of the little window for a long time, forgot his pipe,
and at last wiped a tear out of his eye, saying, as much to himself as
to us: "George Burrows made me first mate of the first ship he ever
sailed. She was named for his mother, and we left her in the ice away up
about the seventy-third parallel.
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