harpoons into the body; but it was successfully accomplished, the line run on board, and the prize hauled triumphantly alongside.  This was the whale they had now brought in.  We shrewdly suspected that it must have been one of those abandoned by the unfortunate vessels who had fled, but etiquette forbade us saying anything about it.  Even had it been, another day would have seen it valueless to any one, for it was by no means otto of roses to sniff at now, while they had certainly salved it at the peril of their lives.

When we returned on board and repeated the story, great was the amazement.  Such a feat of seamanship was almost beyond belief; but we were shut up to believing, since in no other way could the vessel’s miraculous escape be accounted for.  The little, dumpy, red-faced figure, rigged like any scarecrow, that now stood on his cutting-stage, punching away vigorously at the fetid mass of blubber beneath him, bore no outward visible sign of a hero about him; but in our eyes he was transfigured—­a being to be thought of reverently, as one who in all those dualities that go to the making of a man had proved himself of the seed royal, a king of men, all the more kingly because unconscious that his deeds were of so exalted an order.

I am afraid that, to a landsman, my panegyric may smack strongly of gush, for no one but a seaman can rightly appraise such doings as these; but I may be permitted to say that, when I think of men whom I feel glad to have lived to know, foremost among them rises the queer little figure of Paddy Gilroy.

*

CHAPTER XXVII

PORT PEGASUS

The wind still holding steadily in the old quarter, our skipper got very restless.  He recalled his former exploits, and, firing at the thought, decided then and there to have a trip round to Port Pegasus, in the hope that he might meet with some of his former good luck in the vicinity of that magnificent bay.  With the greatest alacrity we obeyed his summons, handling the old barky as if she were a small boat, and the same morning, for the first time, ran out of the Straits to the eastward past Ruapuke Island.  Beautiful weather prevailed, making our trip a delightful one, the wonderful scenery of that coast appealing to even the most callous or indifferent among us.  We hugged the land closely, the skipper being familiar with all of it in a general way, so that none of its beauties were lost to us.  The breeze holding good, by nightfall we had reached our destination, anchoring in the north arm near a tumbling cascade of glittering water that looked like a long feather laid on the dark-green slope of the steep hill from which it gushed.