Life
: ' - ' - I
I i I I
T
-rr nrrri' ii - - i
TRY WORKS OX A WHALING
10 MANY American whalers are
going to seek tho big "fish" in
the Baffin bay waters this season
tnat -e Canadian government has
' decided to charter a sealing
steamer to cruise there to prevent tho
Yankee from "violating Canadian customs
laws." It looks as if tho "prostrated Amer
ican Industry" were about to awaken to
something akin to vigor.
Years of more or less desultory whaling
have given the sea-giants a chanco to re
cuperate; and that they were not guilty of
race suicide during their time of reBt Is
proved by tho fact that whales are 'plenti
ful in all the seas again.
For a rich American, eager to try real
sport, there Is a great chance now. Whal
ing, one of the oldest forms of big game
hunting known, Is the one field which has
not been fittingly exploited by the ama
teur eporteman. In a time when lion and
tiger shooting are mere routine sporting
affairs to hundreds of wealthy men, the
whale should appeal with great force.
To the man who has exhausted even tho
delight of the sixty-mlle-an-hour auto
mobile, there Is an unlimited field. The
chances are that If ho once gets an oppor
tunity to taste the unbridled and terrific
pleasure of a "Nantucket sleigh ride," ho
will view his auto machine as a tame thing
ever afterward.
The Nantucket sleigh ride is so common
an experience with whalers that they are
prone to speak of it in disappointingly
matter-of-fact language. But, for all that,
there isn't an old whaler of them all whoso
nostrils will not dilate with zest when he
thinks upon it. And the landsman who
ever has had tho rare fortune to experi
ence one Is not likely to find anything else
In all the rest of his life that will not
seem tame compared with It.
Few landsmen ever have the opportunity.
When a whaleboat lowers to fight a sixty
foot whale, tho business is too important
to encumber the craft with unskilled pas
sengers. And not many landsmen would
really care to go into the whaleboat even
If they could, when they behold, wallow
I American and English women, for
I a. lnnsr flmA rciFMrflof! a boatwIuI
4at ! a?
on the continent, in tlmo came to
be envied, and is now being emu
lated everywhere. All trades and profes
sions are being opened to woman in such
conservative countries as Russia, Holland
and Germany, reports the New York Even
ing Post. In Russia there aro several
business lirms conducted wholly by women,
and they recently rather startled the min
ister of finance, M. Witte, by sending him
a petition requesting him to allow them to
do business on their own account in the
Stock exchange Instead of employing
brokers. The minister asked for time to
consider the petition.
In Holland a certain Miss Cromer, who
has just taken her degree of doctor of
philosophy, applied to the general synod of
the Reformed Dutch church, asking to be
admitted to serv? as a duly qualified pastor.
Her petition was refused by a majority of
one vote, but the dlMeusuion which was
aroused by her radical request showed a
liberal disposition on the purt of many
members of the synod, and a willingness to
extend the field of work for Dutch women.
Perseverance being on essential virtue of
the pastoral offlc, Miss Cremer may yet
win her permission to preach.
In Germany the women have been apply,
ing for admission to the universities In
such numbers that the authorities Ire
alarmed, and it is rumored that conditions
for admission will bo made more and more
tringeut in the future, in hopes of dis
on Board
-i
n iim , Tr'-trm
SHIP READY FOR BUSINESS.
ing In the ea the huge thing that Is to be
attacked.
The ride begins after the whale has been
harpooned and when the boat header con
siders it.tlmo to draw up alongside and
begin lancing. The first thing thit is done
is to haul in upon the harpoon line until
the boat is brought as close to the running
whale as is consistent with the extremely
delicate margin that the whakr allows for
safety. "Safety" to the whaler really
ineins to remain just about an inch or two
beyond tho reach of the vast flukrs With
which the big beast is beating the sea.
Having hauled as far up on the whale
as possible, tho boat header reaches oer
the bows and lifts the line out cf the
chocks. Swiftly he brings it. around out
side of the boat and passes 'it to the bow
oarsman, who has faced around on his
thwart so that he looks forward.
He at once lays back on the line and
holds fast with all his might. And Im
mediately the boat, dragged like a railroad
car by that mighty living locomotive, be
gins to run parallel with the side of the
whale and just a few feet away from him,
being prevented from running right on
top of him by the oblique strain on the
line.
Now, if the harpoon is well forward , in
the whale, the boat hangs in a' precarious
but sufficient arc of safety, for the swing
ing tall hammers the ocean behind it and
the wildly sweeping Jaw unavallingly
searches the sea in front.
The boat header braces himuelf in the
bows until he is based firmly as the stern
post and begins to poise his long, keen,
razor-edged killing lance, waiting for his
opportunity to thrust it into the whale's
life. Sometimes tho 'opportunity come3
within a minute after haul'ng up on the
big "fish." Sometimes it does not come
until the boat has been towed for many
miles. It does not require very much time
to tow a mllo when a sixty-foot whale is
doing the towing.
As long as the whale runs in a fairly
straight course, the boat will hang to him
like a terrier. Ho may champ and bito
Professions Open' to
couraging the attendance of women. In
i-russia, which has never made any im
portant concessions to the demands of wo
men, the reaction is apparently stronger
than elsewhere. So severe have tho condi
tions for admittance besn made at the Uni
versity of Berlin that the enrolment de
creased nearly one-half in a single sem
ester. In this university women are not
matriculated at all now, and can attend
lectures only as "hearors," and that by
special permission. The example of the
leading Institution in Berlin will, no doubt,
be followed by others throughout the coun
try. Far from indicating the failure of the
women students to show themselves worthy
of the higher education, the attitude of tho
German authorities is plainly ono of defenso
against an advance thoy little believed in
at the outset. They frankly admit as much.
Many Germans object' to the presence of
women In lecture rooms, while apprecia
ting erudition in those who have acquired
their knowledge elsewhere. A celebruted
professor of Sanskrit of Berlin accepted
the assistance of un American woman In
certain of his works, but when she ex
pressed a desire to listen to ono of his
lectures ha replied that she might do so.
and welcome over the telephone. Sho
declined.
English women have less liberty in the
professions than their great political and
soclul liberty would seem to warrant. They
have been excluded from tho bar up to the
present time, but a London woman recently
applied for admission and her application
a Whaling
j" It's
ll4rAK.w:. '
SCENE ON DECK OF WHALING SHIP-OIL TASKS IN PLACE.
and hammer the ocean into acrea of froth
with head, flukes and tall and never shake
it off. His only chance for retaliation is
to run deep or to "mill." "Milling" is the
act of turning suddenly and so bringing
the boat within reach of flukes or Jaws.
The position of the bow oarsman Is no
Joy in a Nantucket f leishrldo. The chauf
four in a racing automobile is In a pnrudlBe
of case and luxation compared with him.
He must keep the boat in position by his
unaided strength. From tho tirao he gets
the line until the ride Is ended he drives
into a smothering sheet of flying spray.
When the sea is high, every billow Is hit
by the boat with a eninph that wrenches
his arms. The strain on the wet line cuts
and burns his hands. Aud if be lets a foot
of it slip he Is disgraced. Once ho Is in it
he is in it for good, with no chance of help
or relief till tho wild advanture Is done.
Often the boat !s hauled so close on a
harpooned whale that the barpooner leans
over and steadies himself by resting one
hand on tho butt of the harpoon that Is
sticking in tho great sea mammal, w'.lla
with the other he drives the kllling-lanco.
Again and again the long weapon is burird
deep in the black sides, until suddenly
thick, black-red clots of blocd well from
the wound, showing that the "life" has
been reached.
Then It is "back," sometimes for dear
life. A whale may take his death so quietly,
co passively, that it is pitiable to see so
mighty a swimmer killed thus easily by
man. Or he may fight till the boat Beems
only a black atom In the sudden uproar
that smites the ocean and sends tons of
water rising till they seem high enough to
wash tho sky.
Tho danger from a fighting whale is not
only in the whale himself. The boat Is a
perfect man-trap of keen, deadly tools.
Lances and harpoons, rutting spades, hatch
ets, knives and boathooks, all sharpened' to
the finest edge the ship's grindstone can
give them, fill the boat. If the whale gets
at It and hurls it into the air, the men
find themselves in murderous company
when the weapons como raining down on
them.
Women in Europe
is now under consideration. The decision was
promised in April. The applicant, whose
name Is not divulged, seeks admission to
Gray's Inn, one of the four inns of court,
the others being Lincoln's Inn, the Middle
Temple and the Inner Temple. These Inns
are governed by the benchers, who super
intend tho admission and education of
students for the bar, the calling of
barristers, and tho regulation of tho pro
fession. The benchers of Incol i Inn have shown
a liberal tendency in their attitude toward
women lawyers. They have given the uso
of their books and library to Miss Cornelia
Sorubjl, a Hindu lawyer, who la now in
London preparing herself for a notable
work among her own people. Miss Sorabjl
took her degree from tho Bombay univer
sity, and lias practiced us an advocate in
the Indian courts. Lately she propounded
a plan for legal aid for property-owning
women, widows and orphans in India,
which has been much discussed both In
India and England, and receives the in
dorsement of a number of eminent men.
The helplessness of the nativo women who
live under the restrictions of tho Purdah is
hardly conceivable In our civilization. All
of their business must be done through a
man ngent whom Ihey are not allowed to
see, or even to converse with, except be
filnd a screen. If the agent is dishonest
the Purdahnlshln can invoke the aid of the
law only through the swindling agent, cer
tainly no very satisfactory medium. Miss
Sorabji's plan la for a corps of women law
years to be attached to tit court of word
Ship
The harpoon line goes hissing out a ser
pent of rope far more dangerous than any
cobra, for let it but kink in the loast and
catch a man and he will fly overboard with
it and out of sight as if he were a mora
splinter of wood.
So there are enough sporting chances In
the whalo to excite and content tho most
exacting of sportsmen. And tho slzo of
the trophy if he "bags" a whale certainly
leaves nothing to be desired.
Captain Davis, one of tho most famous
of the oldtime American whalers, gives
theso as the dimensions of a right whale
yielding 250 barrels of oil.
"Tho blubber of such a whale," he says,
"is half a yard thick, and if put together
in a strip would be Blxty-slx feet long and
twenty-seven feet wldo. The upper Jaw
would make a room nine feet high and
twenty feet long. The lips and throat of
the brute, with the' supporting jawboneo,
will weigh as niui'h as twenty-flvo oxen
of 1,000 pounds each. The tonguo alone
will often weigh as much as ten oxen.
"The spread of the lips is thirty feet.
He can take In fifty barrels of water at
each mouthful. When feeding, a whale
as big as that sifts a track of sea a quarter
of a mile long and fifteen feet wide in ono
run. Then he raises his head, forces hla
mighty tonguo Into the cavity of his whale
bono sieve and drives the water out with
immense force.
"The tall of a right whale is twenty
five feet broad and six feet deep, and thu
point of junction with the body is about
four feet in diameter. In it lie tendons as
big around as a man's leg.
"Tho greatest blood vessels are more than
a foot in diameter. The blood that Is
forced through them by a heart as big
as a hogshead runs in torrents, heated to
104 degrees.
"The respiratory canal 1b more than a
foot in diameter. The rush of air through
it Is as noisy as the exhaust pipe of a thou,
sand horse-power steam engine ; and when
the fatal wound is given, a cataract of
clotted blood is Bpattered over the hunters,
so hot and nauseating that the crew of a
whaleboat often becomes helplessly sick."
department, to whom the widowed Pur
dahnlshln could have free access, and
thereby secure protection for her property
rights. It ii considered highly probable
that women lawyers will bo appointed to
theso positions within a short time. Nat
urally, they will be native women, as far as
they are available. It notable that ths
educated Hindu woman has, in a number
of instances, shown a decided leaning to
ward the legal profession. Miss Sorabjl s
attainments, it is Bald, would be notable
in any country.
Turkey is tho Inst country where wo
man's intellectual emancipation might be
expected, but there are a few encrgetlo
women and more than a few liberal men In
the Ottoman empire who are bent on Im
proving the lot of Turkish women. Amon-i
them are a trio who are now lecturing lr
European cities: Princess Halrle Ben-Aid.
her husband, who although of Swedish
birth, spent Borne years in the service of
the sultan, and an ex-edltor of a Turkish
Journal.
Taking it Out on Family
Mrs. Ferguson-George, what particular
falling of yours did the preacher touch on
In his sermon this mornlngT"
Mr. Ferguson What do you ask me that
question for?
Mrs. Ferguson Because you have been
as cross as a bear ever since you cam
homa from church. Chicago Tribune.
