It would probably never have come to an end, had not a
good breeze sprung up, which sent him off to his own vessel. One
of the lads who came in his boat, a thoroughly countrified-looking
fellow, seemed to care very little about the vessel, rigging, or
anything else, but went round looking at the live stock, and
leaned over the pigsty, and said he wished he was back again
tending his father's pigs.
A curious case of dignity occurred here. It seems that in a
whale-ship there is an intermediate class, called boat-steerers.
One of them came in Captain Terry's boat, but we thought he was
cockswain of the boat, and a cockswain is only a sailor. In the
whaler, the boat-steerers are between the officers and crew, a
sort of petty officers; keep by themselves in the waist, sleep
amidships, and eat by themselves, either at a separate table, or
at the cabin table, after the captain and mates are done. Of all
this hierarchy we were entirely ignorant, so the poor boat-steerer
was left to himself. The second mate would not notice him, and
seemed surprised at his keeping amidships, but his pride of office
would not allow him to go forward. With dinner-time came the
experimentum crucis.
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