Elisha Cushing, skipper of the Beluga, South Seaman¹, of Martha’s Vineyard, was a hard-bitten Yankee of the toughest of that tough race. Even in the sternest of mankind there is usually to be found some soft spot, some deeply-hidden well of feeling that at the touch of the right hand will bubble up in a kindly³ stream, even though it be hermetically sealed to all the world beside. But those who knew Captain Cushing best were wont⁴ to say that he must have been cradled on an iceberg⁵, spent his childhood in a whaler’s fo’c’sle, hardened himself by the constant contemplation and practice of cruelty, until, having arrived at the supreme⁶ position of master of his own ship, he was less of a man than a pitiless automaton⁷ who regarded neither God nor devil, and only looked upon other men as an engineer might upon the cogs of a machine. Few, indeed, are the men who, throughout a voyage lasting⁸ from three to four years, shut up within the narrow bounds of a small ship, could entirely⁹ do without human companionship, could abstain¹⁰ from some friendly intercourse¹¹, however infrequent, with those around them. Yet Captain Cushing was even such a man. No one knew how he passed his abundant leisure. He was never seen reading, he did not smoke, no intoxicating94 drink was ever allowed on board his ship; in fact at all times, except when whale-fishing was being carried on, he was to all appearance a body without a mind, a figure of a man who moved and ate and slept mechanically, yet whom to offend was to court nothing less than torture. Those unspeculating eyes missed nothing; not a member of the crew but felt that in some not-to-be-explained fashion all his doings, almost his very thoughts, were known to the grim commander, and hard, indeed, was the lot of any unfortunate who in any way came athwart the stern code of rules that appeared to govern Captain Cushing’s command. Nevertheless he had one virtue—he did not

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